


The Birds and the Bees

by Luxaria



Category: RWBY
Genre: F/F, did anyone order a fake dating au with a side of pining, they're all happily enjoying their second year
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-07
Updated: 2018-10-22
Packaged: 2019-03-01 16:09:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 34,497
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13298448
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Luxaria/pseuds/Luxaria
Summary: Yang and Blake whoop Team CRDL’s butt in a training session and gain some unlikely admirers. Traditional threats don't seem to work so naturally they decide to follow their (perilously close to former) friends' advice to prove they're not interested. And off the market.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> In the words of past me: I still can’t believe this turned into a fake dating AU.
> 
> This has been in the works for ages and I have most of it written up so now I'm just taking the plunge and posting it.

Weiss still didn’t think there was anything wrong with the solution, it was working right?

Blake would rather that they pick a different strategy of dealing with it- why did they listen to Weiss again?

Yang just wishes her sister and Weiss were a little bit less meddlesome when it came to her love life- especially when it involved her own, _very attractive_ , partner.

And Ruby? Had Ruby known _exactly_ what was going to happen when she suggested Blake and Yang for a 2 v 4 match against CRDL- _well_ …

She probably wouldn’t have changed a thing. It would all turn out alright in the end.

 

She hoped.

* * *

 

_The Beginning of it All- Glynda’s Sparring Class_

 

“C’mon sis! Kick their butts!” Ruby paused for a moment, as if remembering she should probably cheer on her other teammate too, “You too Blake- show ‘em who’s boss!”

Blake turned to her team leader in the stands shouting down at them and gave a sarcastic wave of thanks, catching Weiss rolling her eyes at her hyperactive partner before shouting down her own words of encouragement.

“Remember their weaknesses- we went over this you two, don’t screw it up.” Okay so it might have been the Schnee brand of encouragement but at least she was trying. It was certainly an improvement on past attempts- clearly positive reinforcement was _not_ a thing in the chilly halls of Schnee manor. Blake’s smile turned genuine as she acknowledged her friends.

“Thanks Ruby. And Weiss, _I suppose_.”

Beside her Yang was limbering up, deploying and collapsing Ember Celica to check for issues with her weapon. Judging by her double fist pump, the final deploying of the gauntlets, and her smile widening as she noticed she was being watched, there were no issues with her precious weapons. Blake gave her own weapons a customary once over, not that Gambol Shroud was ever going to be ill maintained- having Ruby “Weapon Nut” Rose as your team leader meant that weapon maintenance was a mandatory, twice a week team activity. Still, she smoothly cycled her weapon through its forms before resheathing it- starting with her weapon sheathed was an unsettling reminder of Adam but it was habit at this point- a habit that had served her well. She was brought out of her thoughts by a light hip bump courtesy of Yang, who was grinning in anticipation of the fight.

“Ready to kick some racist ass, _Belladonna_?” Her partner’s enthusiasm was infectious as Blake found herself smirking back while raising her own hand for a high five.

“I think you’ll find I’m always ready, _Xiao Long_.”

Yang slapped her hand before stepping back smirking approvingly, catching Blake off guard.

“Seems like I am finally rubbing off on you Blake.”

Blake’s eyes widened, not at her partner’s words, but at the slightly flirty tone she’d said them with. Shrugging it off as just Yang being _Yang_ she was distracted from lingering on it by Glynda’s call for both teams to ready and turned to face her teacher, consequently missing her partner’s double face palm and muffled self-chastisements.

On the opposite side of the area stood CRDL- not Blake’s favourite people by a long shot. They were irritating and short tempered on a normal day and today they were bristling at the injustice of- _once again_ \- being picked to be the testing team against fewer numbers.

“I can’t believe we have to fight the bimbo and the emo.”

So, Dove _could_ speak, Blake had been wondering about that. It had been a real possibility for a while that he’d managed to get into Beacon solely relying on hand signals and grunts, but apparently, he wasn’t a mute. And he never even went for the easy Faunus joke; he _must_ be scared. Or already working on pre-fight damage limitation- maybe he assumed that by _not_ reminding the two of them that they were racists they would have a better chance of getting out of this not seriously maimed. Blake smiled slightly; Team RWBY remembered _exactly_ how CRDL had reacted to the reveal of her heritage and they were not going to forget it any time soon.

Of course, it was Dove’s leader who tended to do most of the talking, so she could be forgiven for the assumption of his muteness, and once again Cardin did not disappoint when he opened his stupid mouth.

“Is the princess to scared to get her hands dirty? Not ready to take on _real men_? What about your leader- fell off her bike once the training wheels came off?”

_Ah Cardin- with wit like that who needed sleeping pills?_

Their taunts failed to have any effect on their targets as Yang just laughed them off and put Blake’s thoughts into words.

“Wow Cardin, been thinking those up for a while now? I hope you didn’t strain your brain too much, we can’t have your IQ dropping into negative numbers.”

Blake let out a slightly undignified snort at that one, drawing Yang’s blinding grin her way, it was her turn to throw the boys off their game- what was the point of a good fight if you couldn’t get a bit of a dig in there?

“Ruby felt it would be unfair to have the whole team fight- besides they got all their training done wrestling Zwei into his bath last night, really tired them out y’know? They thought any fight against you guys was going to be less… how did they put it Yang?”

“Less exhausting? Straining? Testing? …Worth their time?” Yang popped in, ticking her suggestions off her fingers as she spoke. Blake turned back to their fuming opponent with an uncharacteristically cheery smile, infuriating them even more.

“Right. Any of those will do. Take your pick or come up with more; we certainly did.”

Glynda chose that moment to stride up, cutting off whatever poor imitations of a comeback CRDL could have hoped to respond with- it was a mercy really, and Blake had a sneaking suspicion that the professor was looking forward to this fight more than usual. Of course, it was only a hunch- fuelled and fanned by the almost constant smirk that appeared on her face whenever she mentioned CRDL’s name.

_Yes, just a suspicion._

“Alright teams, remember that the aim of this combat exercise is twofold: CRDL- remember you are a team and you should work together like a team. Miss Belladonna, Miss Xiao Long: this exercise is a test of your abilities against more numerous and more armoured foes.” _Not necessarily smarter though_ , but Blake and Yang both nodded at their teacher’s stern words, both their grins being replaced with more serious looks as they prepared themselves for the fight.

“This match will last until one team is completely knocked out. Remember that once some’s aura has fallen below the limit they are _out_ ,” she punctuated this with a stern glare at both teams, “and they are not to be attacked.”

CRDL once again plastered smirks across their stupid, dumb faces, _urgh so predictable_. Blake flicked her eyes to her partner who was crouching in her starting position, ready to launch forward and blindside them while she flanked them.

“3.”

Yang grinned.

“2.”

Dove and Lark began to look worried.

“1.”

Blake grabbed the hilt of Gambol Shroud.

“Begin.”

 

* * *

 

_The Stands- Glynda’s Sparring Class_

 

“This is gonna be _awesome_!”

There wasn’t much that could excite Ruby Rose as much as watching people spar. Well, apart from getting into fights herself and maybe cookies. Weiss rolled her eyes and looked back at the ring, hoping that: _one_ , Yang would remember her advice and _two_ , she would actually use it. Blake was the more strategically minded one of the partnership but whether she could reign in the blonde was a different fight entirely.

It was common knowledge that one of the only people on campus more easily angered than Yang was Cardin- a fact that Blake and Yang were 100% ready to take advantage of. Hopefully. Once he was angry he made mistakes- going so far as to take out one of his team members when CRDL fought Pyrrha. Team knockouts were exactly the thing Blake was supposed to be goading him into with her shadow clones and having fought against them herself Weiss knew how frustrating the Faunus’ incredible mobility could be. An easy way to get in his head.

While Cardin was easily the strongest person on Team CRDL, the fastest was definitely Russell- who was also probably the most strategically minded on the team. However, in hand to hand combat Yang dominated the competition, a couple of solid punches should get him on the back foot and hopefully take him out of the running- factoring in a couple of blows from Cardin’s mace to charge up her semblance before finishing him off.

And last and most definitely least, Dove and Sky, who may be in the running for the most useless Hunters in Beacon considering their general incompetence and terrible weapon choices. Weiss was honestly considering buying them new weapons just to shut up Ruby’s complaining- she had taken their basic and, shock horror, _non-transforming_ weapons as a personal slight. 

Actually, Dove and Sky hadn’t really been factored into the plan that much, Ruby had just assumed that Blake or Yang, or maybe even Cardin, would take them out at some point throughout the match. A pretty safe bet.

“Begin.”

Immediately Yang boosted straight off to scatter CRDL from their position; being aggressive and ending the match as fast as possible was the best option for winning- dragging the match out would only let the greater numbers win by attrition. As expected the boys split, Cardin and Dove dodging left while Russell and Sky leapt to right, the latter losing his footing and falling to the ground.

Yang chose to follow to the right.

Sending off a blind shot at the boy on the ground to keep him down for longer, the blonde turned to the dual wielding opponent next to her, who had recovered from the initial shock much better than Sky and was now on the attack. Yang easily dodged the first swing of his knife and sunk her fist into his stomach as he passed- knocking the wind out of him and taking a chunk out of his aura, while throwing him to the ground for a moment of respite that was quickly ruined by Sky lunging at her with his polearm. A quick shot from her gauntlets allowed her to leap backwards to plan her next attack while also getting herself out of range of the long weapon. Sky, in a rare moment of intelligence, continued to press the attack as he forced Yang backwards but his offensive only lasted until she grabbed the polearm and gave a tug bringing him into her range.

On the other side of the training ring Blake took on the other members of CRDL, deftly weaving in and out of the flailing boys, slicing with both parts of her weapon while she summoned clone after clone to launch off and distract her opponents. Cardin was already getting angry and poor Dove was getting the brunt of it- the close quarters nature of his sword and his slow reactions left him well acquainted with the business end of his leader’s mace. Eventually he managed to stumble out of the fray, ending up somewhere between the two fights trying to get his bearings.

While her tactic was working, Weiss could see Blake’s approach wasn’t going anywhere fast and clearly, she could as well. A sneaky foot sent Cardin sprawling and allowed her a quick look around, formulating a plan in her head as she gave a shout of “Yang!” throwing Gambol Shroud at her partner, “Trip!”. The blonde’s head flicked from the weapon being launched towards her to Sky standing next to her and then to a stunned Dove tripping backwards in the middle of everything and made her decision. She ran towards Dove.

As she ran, Gambol Shroud flew past her and wrapped itself around Sky’s waist, his eyes widening comically as he realised what was happening. The line went taught as Yang reached Dove, who only had a moment to try and understand the situation before a golden gauntlet smashed into his face, knocking him out cold as he flew towards the wall.

_*Bzzt*_

The ribbon of Blake’s weapon caught on Dove’s body and swung Sky towards Yang, the arc of his swing bringing him neatly in range of spectacular clothesline as she stuck her arm out to catch him, interrupting his unexpected backflip with a shotgauntlet powered punch to send him face first to the ground.

_*Bzzt*_

“Dove Bronzewing and Sky Lark are both eliminated.” Glynda’s amusement was well suppressed, but Weiss could pick out the hint of a chuckle from her instructor- _it seems like the referee might not be completely unbiased._

Quickly unwrapping the ribbon from her groaning opponent on the ground, Yang jogged over to her partner to group up. Even sitting in the stands Weiss could hear the terrible joke she inflicted on Blake and consequently the rest of them.

“Do you think Dove enjoyed his _trip_?”

Ruby booed while Blake looked amused.

“I’m sure we can get a review and rating for the _Yang Express_ after we finish up the rest of his team.”

Ruby booed louder.

Blake and Yang ignored her.

“You want to take Russell?” Yang stuck her thumb at the boy who was breathing heavily as he clutched his stomach, “I could use a little boost and I think that mace is the perfect pick me up.”

“I’ll never get over how weird your semblance is,” Blake looked over her shoulder at Cardin, who was now running towards them with a very unpleasant look on his face, and blanched, “Of course I’ll take Russell. Have fun with Cardin.”

Both girls took to their new opponents with relish, as double daggers clashed with sword and sheath and mace was deflected by gauntlets. Each fight was now between similar weapons, making it a matter of pride who won. Yang and Cardin’s match was a no holds beatdown as they traded blows and shots that went straight for each other’s weak spots, each one chipping at way at the other’s aura. However, it was Russell that went down first, unable to counter Blake using Gambol Shroud to keep him at a distance before closing the distance for an aura shattering blow from her two weapons. 

_*Bzzt*_

“Russell Thrush has been eliminated.”

The buzzer distracted Cardin, allowing Yang to roll out and get close to Blake for the final fight.

Cardin seemed confused as he looked around, apparently unaware that the rest of his team had been knocked out. He was the only one left- his team lay scattered about the training hall cradling their aching injuries- and now Weiss could see the black and yellow pair look at each other deciding exactly how to finish this. Yang’s crude hand signal indicated _exactly_ what one she wanted and it seemed like Blake was excited to try out the move on a live subject- judging by her grin anyway. Ruby caught on to what they were doing immediately.

“Ohmigosh they’re setting up for ‘ _Float like a Butterfly, Sting like a Bee_ ’!” Weiss couldn’t stop her reflexive eye roll at her partner.

“You do realise that the only thing dumber than team attack names is excessively long team attack names? Never even minding you getting excited over them.”

Ruby narrowed her eyes at her partner, “ _Dumb,_ says the girl that got excited over her new ‘ _E-Z glide handwriting pen_ ’ when _literally_ every pen is the same.” Weiss recoiled like she had been slapped across her face.

“Ruby Rose take that back right now! That is completely incorrect! Everyone knows-”

Pyrrha leant over to the pair, interrupting their argument, “Maybe you two want to leave the argument till later and focus on the move that I _know_ they have been trying to get right for weeks?”

The pair blushed and turned their attention back to the rest of their teammates down in the ring, circling their last opponent. The key to this move was disorienting the target until they had no idea where the next hit was going to come from, in this case achieved by Blake and her shadows. She ran in, flipping around the slow mace wielder, once again avoiding his cumbersome swings while Yang stood back, waiting for the perfect time to strike.

Then Blake left a shadow right in front of Yang before flipping backwards over her partner’s head, giving the perfect setup for her to go crashing through the shadow clone, taking Cardin by complete surprise- having expected another slice from Blake’s sword rather than the explosive fist courtesy of her fiery partner. He had no chance of staying up after that.

_*Bzzt*_

“Cardin Winchester had been eliminated.”

Glynda emerged from the shadows where she had been standing for the duration of the match, lightly smiling at the black and yellow pair, a pair that were celebrating their win with their usual exuberance- well, Yang’s usual exuberance, Blake simply smirked gleefully at the audience of their smackdown victory.

“With a total knockout, Blake Belladonna and Yang Xiao Long win the match- excellent team work you two, I don’t think I’ve seen to partners as in-sync as you in a long time, although,” Glynda regarded the victorious duo over her glasses, “Your impromptu chat in the middle of the fight could have been dropped.”

Yang’s smile fell as she pouted at the stern professor, “Aw, c’mon Professor, we were clearly discussing the strategy going forward- puns don’t discount the fact that I told her I would go punch Cardin and that she should probably take out Russell,” she locked her fingers together, “Synergy.”

Naturally Glynda looked to the calmer of the duo but sadly it seemed that Blake was in one of her “ _Be A Bit Of A Shit Moods”_ , as Weiss had decided to name them after the fourth incident where the Faunus’ facetious remarks had wound them up in detention/almost jail/actual jail. Despite Blake’s arguments otherwise, while she didn’t start things, she tended to just escalate situations because she, _ironically and of course meant in a completely not racist way_ , couldn’t hold her tongue.

“ _Of course_ it was a strategy meeting Professor- any witty banter exchanged was solely because we are just too hilarious to contain it for a full-” she checked the time- “five minutes.”

At that, the professor cracked a smile. A smile that dropped quickly when one of CRDL groaned from his position on the floor- reminding her of the shambolic (in Wess’ opinion anyway) performance of the losing team. She turned to berate them for their complete lack of team coordination, spatial awareness and general strategic planning. It was almost as entertaining as the match itself, lasted almost the same length too, until it was cut off by bell signalling the end of the class.

The victorious Team RWBY left the gym for lunch, high on wiping the floor with the annoyances of CRDL in the second best beatdown of sparring class; Ruby in the lead dissecting the match like any good strategist, Weiss berating her partner for focussing too much on the “cool moves” and Blake and Yang strolling along content behind the bickering pair. A completely normal post-match situation then.

They were, however, completely oblivious to the unintended consequences of their fight, consequences that would become apparent very, _very_ soon.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The calm before the realisation. And a wee bit of trash talk.

_Lunch, After Sparring Class_

Even after she’d spent a year and a half at Beacon, Yang couldn’t resist any time in the spotlight.

Sure, she’d gotten better at staying low key with the help of her teammates but being on one of the teams constantly jostling for the top spot in the year was a nice ego boost. And it wasn’t like she was the only one- pretty much every Huntsman or Huntress had _some_ sort of pride thing going on and it was important to remind everyone else what team was on top and what team was on the bottom. Teams like CRDL for instance. However, even with such a ( _Smackdown? Downright embarrassing?_ ) ... dominant... victory there were still details to analyse and improvements to note for the future, so here Yang sat, listening in to the scarily competent Teams RWBY and JNPR discuss her fight.

If their jobs weren’t so important someone should have been seriously worried about how much eight teenagers knew about incapacitating opponents. With _and_ without weapons.

Nora had some creative uses for household items; Blake’s speciality was _far too personal_ ; Weiss straight up just bribed people; Ruby was a little bit too into weapons; Ren was basically a ninja; Pyrrha could kill everyone here with a tea spoon and, of course, Yang herself was no stranger to getting her hands dirty. Jaune was Jaune, she supposed- although she had to give him credit for his improvements over his time at Beacon.

Deciding that she’d heard enough about how Dove looked when Cardin’s mace hit him for the fourth time, she stretched her arms out above her and let out an exaggerated breath.

“Pfft, even Glynda knew we were gonna win- highlight of her week, one hundred percent guaranteed.”

There were no arguments to counter that statement, the deputy Headmistress was usually as unreadable as Blake (well, to strangers at least, Yang could read her partner like a book) but there was no denying the slight sing-song in her voice as she announced the fights for the week.

“I’m really happy you managed to fit _Float like a Butterfly, Sting like a Bee_ in, buuuut I might be a _teeny_ bit biased about that.”

A pained groan sounded from Weiss as Ruby giggled at both her own statement and her partner’s reaction to it; the team attacks- and their names- had only grown arms and legs as the sisters had realised they could just make up puns and then fit an attack to it later. Much to the well documented dismay of their respective partners (even if they secretly kind of liked them) as the moves tended to be very convoluted in order to fit the “theme”.

Ren took the moment of quiet as an opportunity to speak.

“Personally, I thought the bit where you simultaneously tripped Dove while wrapping your weapon around Sky was inspired Blake.”

The faunus smiled sharply and held her hands up to accept the praise.

“What can I say, I have a flair for the dramatic sometimes-” A sarcastically muttered, unsurprisingly ignored, _sometimes?_ came from Weiss’ general direction, “Although involving Sky in it was all Yang, I was just expecting her to grab it to trip Dove.”

Taking over from her partner she shrugged at them, “Like I always say: well-oiled partnership right here. Plus, I wanted to give you guys a show- can’t let Pyrrha be the only showboater here.”

The four-time Mistral Tournament Champion looked genuinely affronted at the accusation, a rare expression to cross the usually affable fighter. Many people didn’t know that she took any jabs at her fighting style very personally, mainly because it was a rare occasion that afforded someone the opportunity to criticise her. And probably because the brawler was the only one willing to put her muscles where her mouth was.

“I don’t showboat!”

Yang scoffed.

“Oh no, _of_ _course_ you don’t. That spear neck spinning thing you do isn’t just because it makes you looks badass? And you just _have_ to throw away your shield at the end of a fight- a fight that you’ve spent the whole time breakdancing your way through no sweat bee-tee-dubs- so you can suplex a dude. That’s what everyone does, am I right?”

“I’ll have you know that is a legitimate tournament move.”

The blonde cocked an eyebrow at that.

“A legitimate tournament move… for show-offs?”

Jaune (putting his mandatory “How To Be Good Team Leader 101, Part 7: Conflict Management” lessons to good use for once) jumped in before there could be any more words exchanged by the pair. Or fists. The sparring matches between the two were legendary amongst the other students, what with Yang being the number one hand to hand combat student in the school and Pyrrha being, well, Pyrrha.

“Well, we all knew you had it in you, I gotta say you guys work really well together.”

The partnership in question puffed up slightly, Blake would never admit it out loud but she was very susceptible to compliments. Yang had noticed though; her partner didn’t hide it very well and she _had_ always been more perceptive than people gave her credit for. It was nice to see her come more and more out of her shell, since she had been less than interested in making friends at the beginning.

Too bad she got partnered with Yang. If she had wanted a quiet time at Beacon she should have picked her partner more carefully- oh _yeah_ , Yang knew all about the partner picking shenanigans that went on in initiation. Blake _did_ eventually admit to it, but she had known the whole time. _Totally_. She threw an arm around her best friend’s shoulder and smirked.

“That’s just the sort of excellent team work we here on Team RWBY pride ourselves on, although I suppose being Beacon’s top partnership has _a little_ bit to do with it.”

That set the rest of them off, so, _so_ predictably. The table descended into the well-trod discussion ( _argument_ ) that not even Ren could remain above, as his partner brought him in to explain a very complicated move they ( _Nora_ ) had thought of involving a lot of electricity.

A nudge from her side brought her attention to the girl next to her, for once neglecting her book to watch the live entertainment in front of her. As Blake leant in to mutter her observations Yang realised that the room either suddenly gotten warmer or she really needed to get a grip; she prayed for the former and ignored the tiny voice saying it was obviously the latter.

“You shouldn’t rile them up like that, one of these days it’s going to get messy and it’ll be all your fault.”

An exaggerated gasp was the first response to the _heinous_ accusation, a deep betrayal from the girl she  _thought_  was her friend.

“You wound me Blake, truly, deeply. And could anything be messier than the food fight? Which I suppose was _partly_ my fault.”

Let it never be said that Yang Xiao Long didn’t own up to her mistakes.

“Partly?” A perfect eyebrow was arched, “Okay then, if that’s what you want to believe. The goodwill we earned from absolutely _destroying_ CRDL won’t last long if we make Goodwitch clean up after us again; unless they’re up for round two, of course.”

The pair shared a smirk. While it had taken a while, getting Blake out of her shell was the best thing Yang had achieved while at Beacon, if only because it made her time infinitely more enjoyable when there was someone else on her level. The quiet, shy girl was just a protective front to keep herself out of the limelight, which would have probably stayed in place if she'd partnered with anybody else in Beacon. You could  _maybe_ say Yang was a bit of a bad influence.

“I love it when you’re cocky. Anyway, Goodwitch likes you, I’m raised in her esteem simply by being your partner.” A snort indicated exactly what Blake thought of that. “At least you said _we_ , I’m glad to know that _you_ know you’re stuck with me through my poor life choices- not planning on getting rid of me anytime soon?”

Blake smirked at that, eyes sparkling with mischief, and shrugged.

“What can I say, you’re good for a fun time. You keep me on my toes- and keep my life exciting.”

Inside, Yang knew it was slightly pathetic to get so excited, at the thought of someone sticking around for a while, but it had always been one of her weaknesses. Trying not to show a reaction to her partner’s casual assurances that she wasn’t going to drop out of her life she rolled her eyes and dialled up the sarcasm.

“I’m _so_ glad I help you get your kicks somewhere, Hunting is just such a boring and safe career, wouldn’t want you resorting to drastic measures or anything.”

Blake’s laugh had quickly become one of her favourite sounds on Remnant and she would do anything she could do to draw it out as much as she could. Luckily, their senses of humour (barring her disappointing lack of enthusiasm for puns) meshed well, with both being fluent in sarcasm and enjoying the occasional dark joke to top it off. As her giggling died down she caught Yang’s lingering stare and cocked her head.

“What?”

Suddenly self-conscious, the blonde ducked her head, laughing nervously while trying to think up a better reason than ‘ _I find you ridiculously attractive and your laugh isn’t helping things_ ’.

“Uh, nothing, just lost in thought.” The oldest excuse in the book and one that Blake would not let her get away with ever, and not let her away with it she did.

“About what?”

Yang lifted her head back up with a grin.

“About how I’m happy you totally bent the rules and picked me as your partner, enough to give a gal an ego, y’know?”

Tension broken, quick and simple; this wasn’t Yang’s first rodeo. Not by a depressingly long shot.

A quick, playful shove from Blake, one that usually wouldn’t budge the brawler an inch, unbalanced her enough to knock her into her sister and almost push Weiss off the end of the bench. Her scathing glare was missed by her teammates: Ruby because she was desperately trying to salvage her cookie from her milk and Blake and Yang because they were busy having a silent conversation. Team JNPR once again found themselves staring in confusion at the team they’d chosen to befriend.

Yang cut off the start of Blake’s worried questioning with her own explanation.

“I think I’m just tired, if Blake’s weedy arms can push me over,” Another hit, “ _Ow, it’s a joke,_ probably time for us to head off, I have some R&R that is just _calling_ to me right now.”

A fair excuse, one easily accepted by the concerned girl, they had, after all, had a relatively strenuous morning. Yang wouldn’t go as far to say anything more. The rest of the table quickly agreed with the motion to leave, Blake and Yang already standing up to go while Weiss slipped out her end of the table, leaving Ruby to scarf down her last cookie and chug her milk to keep up with her team.

“See you guysh later!”

As the group of girls left the cafeteria, planning their afternoons’ off that would inevitably end in varying levels of successful relaxation, Jaune couldn’t get rid of the nagging feeling that something was wrong.

“Pyrrha?”

The girl in question turned to her partner.

“Yes Jaune?”

“Was there something we were supposed to mention to Yang and Blake?”

The redhead pondered the question for a moment before answering.

“Not that I can remember, no.”

“Hmm, I just have the oddest feeling that we’re forgetting something.”

They were.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When your attempt at asking someone out is indistinguishable from a prank, maybe you should rethink your strategy.

_Library: Later that afternoon_

 

Beacon’s library was massive, containing books concerning everything from rare Grimm to Remnants complicated political systems to especially rare volumes of historical texts. And if there so happened to be a large collection of Blake’s favourite… fantasy… series then that could only improve her opinion of the fine library.

Team RWBY was a team whose continual survival relied on systems, so there were multiple systems in place for many possible situations, feasible or otherwise; systems were kind of a necessity for four girls to co-exist peacefully, without major injuries (or death) occurring and cutting a few letters from their name. Ruby’s “Team Leader Executive Orders” covered everything from important things like shower times to small things (in Blake’s opinion) like “When it’s not appropriate to borrow your teammate's very expensive conditioner, _Weiss_.”

(“I’m a platinum blonde, _Yang,_ yours is the only one sensitive enough for my hair.”

The entitlement in filling her voice was only matched by the venom in her opponent’s.

“You’re also filthy stinking rich, _buy your own._ ”

Eventually Ruby and Blake had to step in to deescalate the situation before they ended up having a very humid room for the rest of the day like the last time the two had got into an argument. Fire and ice make for very uncomfortable room conditions.)

There was a post-fight system too. Blake picked the library as her own little victory celebration- Yang had picked the gym, although more out of inevitability than anything else. The way her semblance worked, while extremely useful in a fight, had the unfortunate side effect of not always draining itself of energy once the fight was over; especially if the fight was… _as unsatisfying_ … as the one against CRDL. This had been discovered, much to Blake’s enduring hilarity, by Team RWBY’s door after the exuberant brawler had unwittingly snapped it in two trying to open it. Her partner’s shocked face coupled with the handle and half the door held in her hand was one of her favourite memories of Beacon so far.

Until Weiss started yelling of course.

To avoid future mishaps, it was now required by Team Leader Executive Order 10 (if Blake remembered correctly, there was a definitely a list somewhere) that Yang had to completely deplete the excess energy from her semblance after a fight.

Never one to pass up on an opportunity, Weiss made sure to add in her own points to the post fight relaxation requirements- leading Blake and Ruby to also chip in with their ideas too.

The library was the perfect place to spend her team mandated two hours of post-match relaxation. The White Fang had never been the literary types, much to her dismay and if she was being completely honest it was on the (long) list of reasons she left.

After the murder, terrorism, grand theft and fanaticism of course. But it was still on the list. Somewhere near the bottom, final nail in the coffin and all that. You have to draw the line somewhere.

It was nice to finally have a team that indulged her reading sessions. No distractions, no games, no homework, no arguments, no teammates; just books.

And that’s how it went for the first hour, as she sat tucked into her favourite snug corner of the library- the nook by one of the windows that let the sun stream in during warm afternoons like this one- happily finding out who was getting together in the latest book of her favourite saga. (She was rooting for the quick talking thief to _finally_ get her shit together and tell the flirty fighter that her feelings were reciprocated.)

She would have managed to find out too- had she not felt the uncomfortable warmth of someone watching her; a quick look around didn’t reveal anyone staring. The nearest tables were empty, exactly as she wanted them, but the unnerving feeling of being watched did not die as she had hoped, leaving her to try and settle back down with her book and ignore her gut. That didn’t work, as she sat on high alert rather than concentrating on the unravelling love story she had _specifically_ picked out to read today. Whoever was behind the disruption was in for a world of pain.

For once her faunus heritage was a boon as she focussed in on a rustling sound coming from behind a nearby bookshelf. It took no effort at all to slink around the other end of the row, the poor boy couldn’t even hear her approach, his head buried so deep in the book in a futile attempt to hide his face from her. A book that was upside down, offering no educational value, even if he had been seriously interested in… the minutiae of Faunus-Human Relations in Business.

Which she doubted. Quite a lot. It would take a lot more in the

“Hello Russell, taking an extracurricular in stalking now are we?”

He jumped at least a foot in the air, which could have been part of his semblance for all Blake knew, she had never managed to see it in action and the semblances of idiots like him didn’t really concern her.

“Uh-“

The pure saccharine tone of her voice surprised even herself.

“If you wanted me to teach you what is looks like when a Faunus is unhappy with you, I’ll give you a hint,” she pulled a grumpy face, “Exactly like this. However, if you wanted me to beat you up again I’m afraid you’re going to have to wait until the opportunity comes back up in class, the five minutes it took me this morning was… how should I put this?”

A sharp grin came across her face.

“ _Immensely_ _unsatisfying_. Now if you have anything left to say please, do it now, some of us have actually important things to do.”

That seemed to kick him back into gear, as the scared look on his face was replaced with another, an expression unfamiliar to Blake.

“I, uh, was uh, just wanting to know- I mean, ask you if you wanted to hang out sometime or something y’know?”

To put it mildly, Blake was stunned. Dumbstruck. Frozen. The words that haltingly tumbled out of Russell’s mouth technically did make sense, but their actual meaning in the context of the world and everything, did _not_. In fact, they made so little sense that it took almost a full minute for her to awaken from her stupor to sputter out an answer to the, admittedly patient, boy waiting in front of her.

“Uh, no, Russel, _no_ \- I don’t know why you thought- definitely no. Bye.”

Contrary to popular rumour, Blake was not the target of many date offers and the ones that did occur tended to be telegraphed correctly enough that she had the benefit of being able to consider her options. She had _never_ been caught off guard. Even if she wasn’t living with the complicated feelings towards a certain someone, which was… perhaps… preoccupying her mind more than she thought it was…

 _No_. No. There’s no way she could have possibly predicted _Russell_ hitting on her, let alone having a prepared answer for him. No way at all.

* * *

 

_Team RWBY’s Dorm: That Evening_

 

Blake walked back into her room in an odd state of shock, she didn’t quite remember the journey from the library, only that she did eventually manage to make it to her room.

“Yang, I just had the weirdest encounter-”

Said teammate stopped in the middle of getting changed, clearly just out of the shower and wearing only shorts and a bra.

“I don’t know Blake, it’s gonna be really tough to top mine-”

And then without pausing, not even to put on an actual top to cover up the frankly ridiculously distracting sight of her six pack, she launched into her story.

“-because I actually feel a little bit dirty after it. I’m pretty sure I’d still feel like this even if I’d just been watching it, never mind being a part of it. Cardin, Cardin ‘Douchebag’ Winchester, had the absolute fucking nerve-the gall!- to come up to me today, after the gym, swaggering like I hadn’t been two punches away from compacting his face this morning and say:” Her voice dropped into what was probably her impression of a caveman, “ _You know, you’re really hot Xiao Long, like definitely in the top tier here and that’s saying something. So how about you let me take you out somewhere and show you a good time._ ”

Yang shuddered, “Talk about fucking creepy, I thought he would have had something else in his chat up line armoury, other than saying I was ‘ _top tier_ ’. Urgh, thanks dude, I already knew it but being validated by a man really makes it real to me.”

As if realising she’d maybe gone slightly off track, Yang acknowledged her now frozen partner.

“So,” returning to her usual jovial demeanour, “What’s your weird encounter?”

Blake was stunned.

No way.

No _fucking_ way was Cardin hitting on Yang.

No _fucking_ way was Russell randomly into her now at the same time.

This was too big of a coincidence.

Someone _had_ to be messing with them.

* * *

 

_Port’s Class: The Next Morning_

 

If it had ever been an idea in their minds that _maybe_ the Russell and Cardin incidents could be brushed off as some weird prank that didn’t quite land right, the next morning proved that it wasn’t just a fever dream.

As usual, Ruby had rounded up her team, munching on cookie as a pre-breakfast snack while trying to herd them out their dorm in a manner almost passing as prompt and efficient. (That would be of course, if an observer had not witnessed the many trial runs and threats it had taken perfect Team RWBY’s _now_ efficient morning routine.) As usual, the team had meandered their way to a variety of appropriate breakfast foods with Weiss and Blake being course corrected by their partners to avoid collisions, both too engrossed in the news and a book to bother with trivial matters such as walking. And, as usual, they sat opposite Team JNPR and, as usual, they listened to Nora’s new ( _old_ ) dream about her and Ren eating pancakes ( _it was cake this time_ ), dragging out the time before begrudgingly heading towards their first class of the day.

“Whoever scheduled Port’s class first thing in the morning is gonna get a talking to from Ember Celica,” the ominous glint from Yang's weapons giving more weight to her statement. A weight that tended to worry her teammates; they knew she was only kidding, _mostly_. And they could sympathise with her, at its very best Port’s class offered little more than interesting stories broken up with occasional practical demonstrations and at its worst… _well_ male ego trip down memory lane could easily describe those lessons.

Ruby didn’t really enjoy his classes and could see Yang’s point. The only thing that got them through most of the lessons was their long running shared notes which had deviated from its original purpose into a long form and indepth history of their boredom throughout said lessons. Yet in this lesson Yang, the main contributor of non-class related discussion, was oddly quiet and Blake, who usually attempted to take some form of notes until the Port exaggeration got too out of hand, wasn’t dropping her snarky asides at all. In fact, they both seemed a bit zoned out, something that continued all the way to the end of the class.

Until something hit Blake on the back of the head.

While usually something like that wouldn’t have phased her big sister, _much_ , the strange mood they black and yellow pair was in had left them with zero tolerance for being messed with.

“Okay whoever just did that is going to be the one getting a talking to from Ember Celica.”

Both of them had spun around quicker than anyone could blink, fists clenched and faces looking… murder-y, if Ruby had to describe the expressions. Blake bent down to pick up what could now be recognised as a, slightly bent from the impact, paper plane. The team looked from the offending piece of paper up to where it came from and found a sight that made their collective jaws drop.

The two least interesting members of CRDL- Dove and Sky- were standing behind them, holding a motley collection of drooping flowers and a small, pathetic sign that was clearly, tragically homemade with the single word- _Date?_ \- scribbled on it.

Blake was the first one to react with a muted, but forceful, “No.” Her partner, was, as usual, the more explosive one of the two.

 “What the actual _fuck_ made you think asking us during class would be a good idea? Did our rejection of your equally scummy teammates not give you any hints? Actually, clearly not, clearly your one shared and functioning brain cells was taking a holiday from the endless and thankless task it is to keep you all alive.”

Naturally, when faced with the sizzling rage of a girl who decked you just the day prior, the pair of boys did look a tiny bit scared. Still, not scared enough for Sky to keep his mouth shut.

“So, if we’d asked you somewhere else would you have said yes?”

Ruby winced in unison with Weiss’ face palm, the poor boy actually sounded hopeful, how could someone be so dense? Was that really what he'd picked up from that?

“ _Fuck no!”_

Apparently, they were not the only partnership in sync on this very weird morning. A morning that could apparently get worse, since Port decided to chime in as he arrived back from whatever fake memory lane he had wandered off down.

“Language girls.”

That was definitely the wrong thing to say to an already fuming Yang.

“ _Excuse me?_ Are we getting done for bad language when they’re up there distracting the class with their dumb, half-assed attempt to ask us out?”

With any other teacher, Yang might have got into some bother but not with Port, who simply chuckled off the retort.

“Haha, they’re just boys being boys, _ah,_ to be young again,” Ruby rolled her eyes, of course he would use this to reminisce, “It was a time for adventure, where anything could happen, fights, journeys, romance-“

Thankfully, the story of Port’s childhood “adventures” would not be inflicted on the class as the bell signalling their freedom rung- especially not team RWBY, who bolted from the room as soon as was humanly possible . Maybe slightly faster in Ruby’s case, as she left a trail of petals in her wake before spinning to meet her teammates.

“Honestly? I didn’t think Port’s class could get _any_ worse, but _yet_ , here we are: rock bottom.”

“Usually I try not to be too disparaging of professors, but yes, I agree, that was terrible.”

“I think I need a shower.”

Yang spun on her heel and grabbed her partner by the shoulders.

“Blake, forget showering, we need to do something about this. _Immediately_.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm writing this the night before the Vol 5 finale, so hopefully there's some Bumbleby in there. Please?


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Plans are made. Weiss regrets some decisions. And Blake completely ignores her gut.

_Lunch Hall- That Afternoon_

 

“All cards on the table, I honestly didn’t think it would happen.”

The two top scoring second year teams of Beacon sat opposite each other, discussing the newly created CRDL problem. Naturally the girls’ first port of call (after the shower, if only a mental shower) was the only person in Beacon who could possibly have any experience dealing with… such a unique issue.

“So, they’re into girls beating them up?”

Ren nodded.

“That’s what we think anyway, the data pool is really just Pyrrha at this point,” He cocked his head, “And you guys now, I suppose.”

The rest of the group was contemplative, some sneaking looks at the backs of CRDL’s heads, as they sat completely unaware of the judgement radiating from the table on the opposite side of the hall.

“Not the weirdest kink I’ve heard of, but it is up there.”

Eyebrows were raised around the table; Weiss might have choked a little bit on her drink, but no one seemed to notice as they stared at the girl at the end of the table.

“Coming from you Blake that statement carries a lot of weight.”

“Shut up Yang.”

The last statement was punctuated with a glare fended off with a teasing smile, allowing Blake to roll her eyes and turn her attention to her book.

“It is weird though, a whole team… attracted… to the same sort of thing,” Pyrrha paused for a moment staring into the distance, “A pretty big coincidence.”

Team RWBY blanched, but remained quiet. A bit too quiet apparently as JNPR eyed RWBY suspiciously, but no-one elaborated; what was discussed at 3 am in the dorm room stayed in the dorm room at 3 am.

“So anyway,” Weiss cleared her throat, eager to move on, “How did you managed to stop them _assisting_ you in the end?”

Pyrrha went an uncharacteristic shade of red as she coughed slightly.

“Haha, well you see… I didn’t really. But I used their newfound… _attraction_ to me to get them to stop picking on Jaune and Velvet at least.”

Ruby sighed and leant on her arm, “Of course _you_ go the actual superhero route- you’re showing up the rest of us here, honestly.”

The group fell into a thoughtful silence as they contemplated how to… curb… the affections of CRDL. Well, most of the group, Blake stuck her head back in the book she carried everywhere to specifically avoid situations like these. Social situations.

Weiss decided to speak up first, scrunching her face up as she carefully sounded out the idea, “What if, we can show them that you definitely aren't into them? That might work.”

Ruby giggled.

“And how do you suggest we do that then? Because short of almost stabbing him, I don’t remember you having much success telling Jaune you weren’t interested in him; so what’s the plan this time?”

Weiss rolled her eyes as she remembered those dark days of first year, what Pyrrha sees in him she could not begin to understand.

“First, everyone knows Jaune is just incredibly dense,” Jaune’s protest was drowned out by Nora’s sagely _True_ and nod of her head, “And secondly, well, what if we could show them they were well and truly off the market- not just now but forever. Such as,” she shuffled away from Yang slightly, “Such as if they definitely weren’t into guys.”

A book slammed down at the other end of the table, indicating that Blake had given up trying to ignore her so called friends in order to rejoin the conversation after Weiss’ proposition. Her eyes narrowed as she leant forward so she could try and stare her teammate in the face around Yang.

“I know you get all your guidelines for acting like a normal human being from movies Weiss, but this is a new step. Are you seriously suggesting that Yang and I fake date to get them off our backs? How cliché can you get?”

Before anyone could react to that question, Yang threw her arm around her partner and gasped dramatically, “Only fake date?” She threw a hand over her face, “I’m crushed forever Blakey- how will my poor heart ever recover from this most brutal of rejections?”

Rolling her eyes at her partner’s antics and fighting a smile, Blake gently pushed her back up to a proper seated position- _not_ precariously slipping down to her lap, “Shut up you idiot.” It was said with such a fondness that Yang could only grin in her usual carefree way as she straightened up, before winking at the faunus. Which apparently gave Pyrrha the cue to inform the group that even she wasn’t completely against the idea.

“If I’m being honest, you two are probably close enough to pull it off- you look good together.”

Yang scoffed, but refrained from any of her more exuberant moves as she attempted to rebuff the champion’s point.

“Yeah, but we’re hot, of course we look good together- doesn’t mean we would be jumping in each other’s pants.” 

Nora looked her dead in the eye.

“But you think she’s hot?”

Luckily the rest of the table missed Weiss’ instinctive _of course she is_ as once again, Yang was left fielding the questions.

“That’s just an objective fact!” She caught herself before continuing down that line of thought. “But that’s not the issue right now! Just because we’re partners who work well together doesn’t mean we _need_ to get together! That’s not how-” Yang cut herself off as she remembered exactly which team she was speaking to, “Urgh.”

Then Ruby piped up.

“Never mind our Dad, Yang.”

A second groan slipped from the tired girl as she gave up trying to argue that point, since it offered little defence against the against the cross examination she was up against.

“You guys are impossible. Blake’s my best friend, I just don’t want to make things weird, right Blake?”

Bringing the attention back to her black-haired teammate worked, for once Yang didn’t seem to want the spotlight on her, but apparently neither did her partner as she tried to hide behind her hair.

“Uh, I mean, it would be a bit awkward?”

Well it wasn’t a hard no there, so clearly Blake had weighed the options and picked Yang over CRDL hounding her. Ruby had come to the same conclusion as Weiss, as she pointed accusingly at Blake.

“She didn’t say no!”

Honestly, she was now regretting suggesting the idea in the first place but the whole thing had grown arms and legs now; from across the table Ren put in his own two lien.

“Although it has merit I think this plan could backfire, the only thing more attractive- to guys like them of course- than two, with respect, hot girls is two hot girls who are dating. How do we know they won’t just up their creepiness?”

Yang shot a grateful look at the boy across from her, one that was not missed by Weiss, but she would have to get back to that later, since she was distracted by Nora slamming her hands down on the table.

“Nonsense Ren! You think too much.”

A high five between the two most excitable members of the teams punctuated the sentence, as Ruby stood up at the head of the table, filled with the same sort of enthusiasm that led to the food fight. Yep, Weiss didn’t have the gift of foresight, but she could see this whole thing going pear shaped.

“Nora’s right! This is a fantastic idea Weiss, it is gonna be great.”

Weiss did try to object slightly, “I would just like to say, for when this plan inevitably backfires, this idea was formed entirely by everyone else, Blake was the one that brought up fake dating. I was merely the jumping off point, so I will take credit for the initial idea if it works out but when it doesn’t you were the ones who did this.”

Finally, Blake came out of her quiet state the other side of Yang by snorting derisively at her. 

“Your dad has you trained very well, doesn’t he?”

The heiress simply delivered one of her sharpest smiles as the answer to Blake’s sarcastic barb, it was good to know she was still perfectly capable of being snippy. Yang was faring less well with the planning, which was odd because Weiss would have assumed this was the exact sort of thing she would find hilarious. Maybe it was all less funny when you were the one in their position.

“You guys are just getting me back for that comment about us being the best partnership, right?”

A chorus of non-committal shrugs and noises echoed around the table, until Nora came out with a “Yeah, probably.” Blake narrowed her eyes at them all.

“Eh, I think the both of us are being punished for that one.”

Ruby, stepping in with her true leader voice, spoke up this time.

“Yeah, but you always agree with her, so it’s not like you’re blameless is it- also you always lead the conversations that way.” It was true, Blake was an almost professional shit stirrer (if there was a politer way of saying that, Weiss hadn’t found it yet) and she took a special delight in doing it in the subtlest ways.

“I think you might as well give it a go- what’s the worst that can happen?”

Urgh, of course Jaune would say something as cliché as that, he never failed to remind Weiss how glad she was to have Ruby as her partner and leader, he was just so… boring sometimes.  Sadly, he got the last word in about the plan as the bell interrupted any chance for the others to point out the many, many flaws with his question.

As the rest of the partnerships left to go their own separate ways for the classes, Yang perked up, her face brightening in realisation and Weiss could almost hear the lightbulb _ding!_ in her head.

“Wait, I’m pan, not a lesbian- this doesn’t even prove anything! Ah _ha_!”

She wasn’t getting out of this that easily, Weiss had waited too long get her own back for the many jokes at her expense over their time together and this seemed like the best opportunity for the joke to be on someone else for once. She patted her teammate on the head as she walked by and sniffed, “They’re idiots Yang, like they’re going to know the difference, I doubt they even understand the concept. Find another excuse.”

The dull thunk of her head hitting the table accompanied by a quiet _“We can change their minds… probably”_ from her partner indicated that maybe their friends were more enthusiastic about the prospect of the decoy relationship than the two people actually involved in the plan.

 

* * *

 

_After Classes, In Team RWBY’s Dorm_

 

Yang looked from Blake to Ruby to Weiss, and back to Blake, and then ran a hand through her hair as she returned to staring at her sister and her partner as they sat expectantly on the latter's bed. Blake stood awkwardly by her side, _this is not how I expected today to end and having to do it in front of Yang’s sister is frankly just weird._

Blake had been wrong before, they couldn’t sway their teammates. Or at least they couldn’t come up with a better solution. After narrowly avoiding another CRDL love-ambush ( _Ew,_ she _had_ to think of a better name than that) they had reluctantly come to the conclusion that the fake dating option might be their best option; it had been that or another beatdown and they didn’t want to risk expulsion or worse, exacerbating their unwanted admirers’ feelings.

“Why do we need to do this again? I mean I'm not objecting to kissing Blake but is there really a need to practise?”

Weiss huffed and waved her arms, “We all agreed that the only way that this was going to work was if it was believable- or do you _want_ the hairy apes of CRDL to trail after you like lovesick puppies desperately trying to get in your pants?”

A collective shudder went around the room at the mental image. A second, less desperate attempt was made by the blonde to get them out of the situation.

“It's just weird practising making out with your partner while your sister and her partner look on and give “tips” about how to make it work,” Yang frowned, “On that note why do _we_ ,” she waved her hands between herself and Blake, who was resolutely staring at the ceiling taking deep, calming breaths, “Need tips? I have more experience than both of you _combined_ \- this is my area of expertise y’know.”

Ruby rolled her eyes at her sister, “Believe me I know Yang.”

At this point Blake felt it was necessary to step in, _defend her honour and all that_ , “As a matter of fact, I _also_ know how to kiss people, so I really don't see the point in this.”

Ruby let out an exasperated full body sigh and gestured intently at each of them in turn.

“We get that you can kiss individually, we aren’t doubting your individual kissing prowess, but can you kiss each other? We just want to make sure it’s believable.”

“Of course I can kiss Blake! And of _course,_ it’s gonna be believable I don’t exactly need much-” She stopped abruptly, drawing the enquiring eyes of the team as she tried to work out what she was going to say next and a small, currently easily ignored spark, lit somewhere deep within Blake. Instead, Yang rubbed her face and simply repeated: “I can kiss Blake.”

Weiss folded her arms in the most Weiss fashion imaginable. “Well prove it.”

The gauntlet was thrown, and everyone knew from experience that Yang was going to pick it up and run with it, something about the way Weiss phrased things made it impossible for her not to accept her challenges.

“Fine.”

Taking a deep breath Yang turned to Blake, who now surely had a light dusting of pink across her nose as she stared back at her partner with a shocked expression. She leant in slowly, purposefully but slowly, like she wasn’t really putting all her effort into it, which Blake thought was fair. She had never been that into massive public displays, especially when the public in question was the girl you were kissing’s sister and Weiss Schnee, just to amp up the awkwardness that _little_ bit more.

The kiss can’t have lasted more than two seconds before her partner pulled away and it hadn’t been anything spectacular or mind blowing, it was just over. Which was a bit disappointing, since judging from the reactions of Yang’s past conquests, whatever moves she pulled made them desperate for more that she wasn’t usually up for giving. The only reason she ever gave for not going further was an enigmatic smile and _I don’t need anything serious right now, just fun_ , which was not what her trail of broken hearts wanted to hear, especially certain more secretive admirers of hers.

Weiss was clearly unimpressed with their effort.

“Wow, I’m _so_ glad I got to see what it’d be like if you two were kissing your grandmothers’,” she said unhelpfully, a deadpan look on her face, the two in question whirled around, the daze broken by Weiss’ sarky comment.

“ _Excuse me?_ ”

A bashful and all around rather uncomfortable looking Ruby was the one to elaborate for the two kissers- Blake didn’t think she’d ever seen her leader look so reluctant to speak in front of her team.

“That was pretty weak you two… like, tame.”

Yang recoiled backwards like her sister had just thrown something at her, face morphing into an expression of confusion mixed with anger, at least since her eyes weren’t red the confusion was clearly winning out.

“You start practicing kissing in front of me and see how well you perform!”

Deciding to cut off any _performance issues_ jokes before they started- Blake could _see_ Weiss gearing up for the sweet, sweet payback she could dole out to the blonde- she jumped in to defend herself. Again.

“We could always just be one of those couples that don’t kiss in public? I’m 99% sure that Ren and Nora have never kissed and they’re the most together couple I know.”

Once again, Weiss looked unimpressed.

“Ah yes, Yang Xiao Long, not attempting to do any PDA is the hallmark of her relationships, how silly of me. Get _real_ Blake, anyone dating that,” she gestured to all of Yang, “Is probably going to be all over her.”

While Blake had to admit she had a point, she joined the rest of their team in side eyeing their white-haired teammate.

“ _What_?”

Yang spoke up this time, “Are you sure _you_ don’t want to date me?”

An eye roll that had an awful lot of head roll took over Weiss.

“I was just stating an objective fact, judging by your past partners- they all had that in common if nothing else. And it’s not like you shirk away from PDA either.”

The girl in question had the decency to blush- out of the whole team she had the most (not by a lot, but still the most) dating experience. Clearly annoyed by the segue off topic, Ruby coughed and brought all the attention back to her and ventured a question:

“Yeah, even Blake is pretty huggy with us all these days, there’s no way she wouldn’t like, uh, y’know, shy away from PDA.” While she resented the implication she was once standoffish, Ruby had her pinned down on that one. She _did_ enjoy being close to people she liked and she might’ve just found the one person she could tolerate breaking the vague limits in her head. “So, one more time…  with feeling?”

Once again, Yang faced her partner, this time brushing one hand against Blake’s face to push some of the jet black hair behind her ear, the intimate move causing her breath to hitch as she stared intently into her partner’s eyes.

“Do you trust me Blake?”

Startled by the question the faunus drew back slightly, “Of course I do Yang- uh, why is this coming up now?”

“Okay, just go with me here, I’m gonna pull out all the ol’ Xiao Long moves.”

Before Blake could even try to talk herself out of this stupid situation Yang pulled her closer, one hand cradling her face while the other made its way down towards her hip, which would usually be distractingly close to her butt. _Usually distracting,_ if it wasn’t for the careful capturing of her mouth by Yang’s. This kiss was softer, like her partner was afraid of breaking her yet not chaste like before. This kiss came with feeling, with heart. This kiss was… _needy_. Intoxicating. Desperate for reciprocation; which Blake found herself giving freely. The hand on her face made its way around to the back of her head, tangling in the roots of her hair, increasing the pressure between them and she found her own arms draping themselves over Yang’s shoulders to pull her further down. She moved into the kiss, pressing their bodies together, the closeness only heightening the experience. An errant brush of the base of her ear released a purr from her chest, something she couldn’t bring herself to care about at this precise moment in time- Yang’s lips on hers were the only thing that really mattered right now.

Until they weren’t there anymore, her partner pulling back looking very pleased with herself, Blake wasn’t even sure her legs still worked as her waist was still circled by Yang’s arms. The pair were the only people that existed in her very narrow view of the world. The blonde’s hair was slightly mussed- Blake didn’t even remember touching it- but that likely had nothing on her own

She forced herself to breathe, lest she pass out from the latent intensity of the of the kiss.

“You were not kidding about the Xiao Long moves, where did you learn those?” She immediately waved her hands up, wincing, “Wait- I don’t think I need to know. Not right now.”

A smile that could only be described as devilish worked its way onto Yang’s already smug face, a good look for her, if Blake’s subconscious was being honest.

“Oh no, you don’t learn that- hone it _maybe_ , but that’s pure natural born skill- got it from dad probably, apparently he was something of a ladykiller.”

Ruby groaned, “Please don’t bring our parents into this.”

That had snapped the pair sitting on the bed out of their awkward staring at the floor session, clearly when Weiss had taunted them she hadn’t quite expected them to get so into it. _Too bad Weiss_ , _serves you right_. Blake did feel slightly bad for Ruby though, who had gone bright red and was repeatedly clearing her throat while, assumedly, trying to think of something else to say.

“Uh, okay, you two proved your point… very thoroughly, maybe a bit too thoroughly, you didn’t need to go that far but at least, _uh_ , it’s believable?” Ruby fiddled with her hands for a moment before snapping to attention, “Okay Weiss, you said we needed to do that essay, right?” A small nod to the affirmative came from the girl at her side, who now had a strange look on her face while she regarded the standing pair, as if she was trying to puzzle something out but didn’t quite have all the pieces. Unluckily for her she wouldn’t get the time to connect the dots as she was dragged bodily from the room by her partner- barely able to grab her bag on the way out.

In their hasty departure they left an awkward room.

“We may have broken Weiss... or awoken something,” Her partner shrugged turning to face Blake with an easy-going smile, “Well there’s worse ways for her to find out.” The joke was light hearted, an easing of the tensions permeating the room as the pair was left alone with only their thoughts and each other. And the thoughts were mostly of each other.

“Sorry about,” Yang waved her hands like she always did when she was nervous, “Well I mean I’m not that sorry about kissing you- I _mean *ahem*_ ,” she coughed lightly, clearing her throat and standing up straighter, “Kissing you was lovely, but uh, I don’t know if you were uncomfortable or anything, I wouldn’t want make you uncomfortable at all. That would be-”

Blake cut her off with a peck to the cheek that lit her face on fire- not literally, although with Yang that was always a danger.

“It was fine, uh, more than fine,” She looked away from the blonde, feeling her own face start to warm, “We should probably get used to it, it being closeness,” she gestured between them, “and… the other stuff… if this plan of our _glorious leader_ and the rest of her cronies is going to be believable.”

They stared each other down, watching the blushes fade from their partner’s face as Blake’s mind wandered, wondering what Yang was thinking about the frankly mind-blowing (in her opinion anyway) kiss they’d just shared. Was that how all her kisses had gone? No wonder people wanted more. Was it just her that felt that it was so, _ironically_ , real? Realising they’d been staring at each other, Yang picked up her train of thought.

“Oh yeah, I’m gonna have to force myself to do _that_ again, gonna be _such_ a chore.”

A snort escaped Blake as she shoved her lightly on the shoulder, the lack of extension reminding her _just_ how close together they’d been standing and causing her to take a couple steps back and go to grab the book she had to return to the library. A cheeky thought crossed her mind.

“Wait, you mean you _don’t_ kiss all you friends like that?”

This time it was Yang who snorted, as she adopted a grin and shook her head.

“Oh yeah, don’t think you’re special Belladonna, I’ve got Pyrrha lined up right after you. Ren’s my 4 o’clock and, you know, one of these days I think I’ll finally get Weiss.”

She mocked gasped and dramatically supported herself on the door frame, “We’ve been dating for an hour and you’re already going behind my back with other people, Xiao Long you _scoundrel!_ ”

An over dramatic sigh escaped her scene partner, as she shook her head, desperately trying not to succumb to the giggles that were surely bubbling to the surface.

“ _Fine_ , you can have Weiss if it makes you feel better- honestly, the things I do for love.”

Blake couldn’t help herself as she broke down in laughter as she turned to follow their teammates out the door: that’s what made Yang her best friend. Anyone else would have made it awkward after making out like that, but Yang knew just what to say to let her know they were still the exact same as they were before. Well, maybe with more kissing, but _hey_ , Blake wasn’t that against the plan if it came with perks like that.

She was so lost in thought that she missed the drop of her partner's shoulders and missed the dragging of her hands down her face.

Missed the muttered, _Oh, I am so completely fucked_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, I know Blake did that classic gay gal thing where she's like, "I'm sure she does that with all her friends" but that's me just calling out all you wlw out there who know they do this. This is twenty-gayteen people, do not friendzone yourselves.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things are going relatively well on Yang and Blake's first full day of "dating", although their fellow students at Beacon don't seem to be noticing the relationship upgrade. Which is a problem for their plan but Yang really can't find it in her to be upset.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a whole chapter from Yang’s point of view, because she can be so much fun to write, although I think Suffering Weiss and Sarky Blake just slightly pip her to the post. (And I’m sorry Ruby, you get the short straw of any conversational piece because I struggle to write you… just like the writers in Volume 5 ooh sick burn! Sorry, that was just me griping.)
> 
> I made this one a bit longer to make up for the wait. I'm sorry.

_The Next Morning: Oobleck’s Class_

The day had started off as usual, as normal as a chaotic Team RWBY morning could be anyway, with a scrabble for the shower, a scrabble for clothes, a scrabble for bags and a hurried reminder “To act like you're dating each other for god's sake.”

Yeah, the usual.

In the case of “acting like they were dating” they had apparently looked so in sync before that their news barely registered and they eventually realised they would have to start dropping way more hints before people got the message, which left breakfast a smooth, if ineffective, transition.

The ones that did notice, didn’t care, minus a few glares thrown their way. Which turned out to be from people disappointed they were no longer on the market, apparently Blake had her own fair share of admirers amongst the student body that had pined from afar. She said she had been unaware of this, and Yang had to try very, very hard not to list all the reasons that she was a very, very attractive person. Still, Blake reacted to the whole situation with her familiar aloofness and usual sarcastic asides.

“Should we be worried or amused that us dating is not a big deal? Or dare I say, expected.”

Strictly from Yang’s side… she didn’t know what to think, she knew what she _wanted_ to think but cheering about having your secret crush validated by half the school population was going to have to wait until she was alone. Out loud, she had to be a bit more neutral.

“Well, as Ruby so kindly pointed out yesterday, I think teammates hooking up in some way, shape or form is kinda common,” Yang shrugged, “My dad is the prime example there, I guess it runs in the family.”

A sly smile made its way onto Blake’s face. She was very good at those, especially when her ears flicked playfully to show when she was feeling mischievous. Like right now.

“So, if you’re following the pattern… do I have to watch out for Weiss or…”

Speak of the devil and all that, she appeared, this devil wearing white and being a compulsive over achiever who could not _chill_ for two seconds. Only metaphorically of course, Yang had been on the wrong end of some her icy attacks in training and those were _not_ fun, even with a fiery semblance like hers.

“If you two want to actually get the message to circulate around the school you should probably do something more obvious to telegraph this whole thing- like holding hands, you’ve never done that before right? That cannot possibly be passed off as just _gal pals_.” Her exasperation at that last phrase was almost a physical entity.

Her perseverance to getting them to keep up the act would have been worrying, had she been anyone other the perfectionist they had come to know and tolerate while at Beacon- it was Weiss’ own odd way of showing them she cared. Didn’t mean Yang had to take it completely lying down.

“Since when did you become a PR and relationship guru?”

Weiss scoffed as she turned to leave.

“I’m a Schnee, I lived and breathed PR from before I could walk.”

Despite never rebutting the relationship guru title the pair knew better than to argue with her, acquiescing to her plans since there was no point in limiting their awkward fake relationship to their room. The hand holding experiment commenced on the way to class and suddenly Yang realised a major flaw in this plan.

She ran hot.

It was well known that her semblance involved fire but for once she wished her high natural high body temperature would deactivate, just so she could stop sweating, so her hands would just dry up as she became _acutely_ aware of how quickly her hand was warming now that she was holding Blake’s.

In fact, Yang was hyper alert- just only to everything to do with Blake- a stampede of Goliaths could trample through Beacon’s courtyard and she’d only notice once they hit her. Luckily Blake seemed to be in a similar situation, judging from the furtive looks as they traded glances, managing to miss each other by fractions of seconds until they caught one another and looked away.

By the time the team made it to Oobleck’s class she had brainstormed a hundred ways they could show off this relationship (many tip toeing along the line of appropriateness while far more blew passed it like Ruby smelling fresh cookies from three rooms away) without having to hold Blake’s hand for longer than it took her melt in it.

Nora quickly spotted them and leant across the gap in the desks to whisper (although her idea of whispering was apparently a normal level of speech for everyone else, just with some extra sibilance for good measure) to the four girls settling in.

“I see hands touching! This is happening isn’t it!”

Now that Nora knew they could rest assured that the rest of the school would know within about half an hour. Sooner, depending on their proximity to the walking loudspeaker that is Nora Valkyrie.

Normally, the nod of the affirmative from the team would be enough, but from Yang’s side Blake wasn’t about to let her get away with that comment without _some_ retaliation. After all, how could she let one half of Beacon’s original _Are They, Aren’t They_ couple go around making declarations about other people’s business.

“If that’s your definition of a relationship are you and Ren even friends?”

Nora, as usual, was unphased by Blake’s deadpan question.

“I respect his personal space in public… in private, that’s a different matter.”

Honestly, Yang didn’t want to even think about it- that was Nora and Ren’s business that she had absolutely no desire to even question. Which she luckily didn’t have to as Oobleck coughed slightly and launched into the day’s topics, something historical with ramifications to the present that was probably important, and she would have paid attention to had it not been for a certain distracting faux girlfriend.

Blake had taken it upon herself to sidle up and press herself into her side, resting her body slightly against hers as she casually took notes, like this was something she did every day. A snort from behind Blake drew her attention to the rest of the team, Weiss’ poker straight face (with a hint of side eye) as she took notes contrasted well with Ruby’s grin and double thumbs up. Yang couldn’t let this slide, at some point she was going to have to fight back, why not now?

Checking that Oobleck wasn’t looking directly at them, in case this went pear shaped, she lowered her hand to the thigh pressed up against hers and squeezed. It had the desired effect as Blake shot up wide-eyed and blushing at the contact then whipping her head around to look at Yang, who was innocently smiling back her, blatantly not paying attention to the lecture.

“What are you doing?” She muttered under her breath, not angrily but still with a bewildered edge to her tone.

“We’re _young_ and in _love_ and in a class where we _know_ Weiss is taking notes for us, I think we should just play around,” She traced circles on Blake’s thigh and could see the other girl repressing shivers and trying to concentrate on the man bouncing around in front of them.

“I really don’t need to start getting kicked out of class now, Yang.”

Her attempts to concentrate on the lecture were admirable, even if Yang knew it was all a show. Oobleck sometimes had moments of wisdom and interesting points but it was fifty-fifty whether he was going to display his intelligence in class. Today didn’t seem to be shaping up as one of those days.

“Maybe you shouldn’t have started with the cuddling up then?”

Blake shot her a sharp look before realising that was exactly what she was doing and she suddenly looked away and stammered slightly. Over her shoulder Weiss rolled her eyes.

“But you’re comfy and I now have an excuse to- uh, I mean-“

Yang rested her head on her hand as she watched her stumble over her words. _It was adorable_.

“You mean you thought you needed an excuse to get all up close to your favourite team mate?”

Another eye roll from Weiss and Blake turned to look at her with a smirk.

“Well I’m not dating Weiss so that’s gonna be hard.”

 _Ouch_.

“You wound me Blake, I’m the one who’s supposed to be hitting on Weiss.”

Apparently, that was the last straw for Weiss since her eye rolls had not been getting the message across as she tapped something out on her scroll and sent it with a glare. Their phones in their pockets buzzed simultaneously as their group chat received a new message and Yang quickly snuck hers out.

_Weiss: If you two don’t shut up I’m going do something awful to you, I know where you sleep._

Another message followed it.

_Weiss: And stop bringing me up when you’re flirting, it’s incredibly weird and I don’t need any more people gossiping about me._

The pair stifled giggles and turned to Weiss, Yang waggling her eyebrows while Blake stuck her tongue out, who sighed and returned to watching Oobleck bounce around the room. Safe from her judgment, Blake and Yang silently agreed that they probably should also get back to paying some semblance of attention, before things got too out of hand.

Yang counted the fact that Blake hadn’t removed her hand from her thigh as a victory.

_Lunch Time: The Dining Hall_

Naturally, Yang found it difficult to adhere to Weiss’ request.

“It’s such a shame I won’t be able to follow in my dear old dad’s footsteps...”

Huffing and focussing back on her own scroll, Weiss was avoiding all of their attempts to needle her into saying something about joining them in their relationship. Blake “truly and deeply” believed that it was the best way to get CRDL even further off their backs and Yang couldn’t think of any way to pass the time better than to annoy their seemingly prudish teammate.

“Is it because Weiss isn’t that great of a kisser?”

Said girl’s head spun around so fast her poor partner was whipped in the face by her ponytail (“ _Wha- Blergh! Weiss!_ ”) and her tirade would have no doubt been legendary, had she not stumbled trying to get it out.

“Wha- excu- _Blake!_ ”

Ignoring the choking noises of Ruby in the background as she tried to spit out the last remaining strands of white hair from her mouth.

“It was a joke Weiss,” Yang rolled her eyes then abruptly stopped and smiled flirtily, “ _Although if you need the practise…_ ”

Just the tone of the statement almost set the girl off spluttering, one of the many downsides of her upbringing was that she hadn’t ever learned how to deal with the good-natured teasing that came with real, human friendships. Something Yang had only been too happy to give her a crash course in, now they could be classed as actual friends, _again_ self-appointed due to her extensive experience as a big sister.

Ruby had been her reference for the position just in case, but she’d had it in the bag from the beginning.

(Blake’s weird mix of being an only child and former teenage rebel had not gifted her with the _right_ sort of teasing, her talents had only come to light recently, when she decided she wanted ruin Yang’s chance of ever getting a good night’s sleep with her lilting innuendos echoing around her head.)

Finally, Ruby had removed all the hair and took pity on her partner.

“Stop fake hitting on Weiss, Yang, her brain’s gonna melt or _worse_ ,” Ruby paused dramatically, “We _could_ end up with a STRQ 2.0 situation.” It was comforting how much her sister did not want to think about Yang’s love life in any way shape or form.

“I wouldn’t worry about that Ruby,” A hand slipped under Yang’s arm, “She’s mine now.”

Yep, there it was. That wasn’t going to be helping her situation anytime soon, she’d bet Ember Celica that voice would be popping up in her dreams. Did Blake, like, _know_ how that sounded? Was it on purpose or could she just not help it- actually, Yang didn’t know which one was better; either way opened up far too many opportunities to for Blake to tease her, knowingly or unknowingly. And that was gonna make this whole thing a lot harder- unless she volleyed everything just as hard.

“Ooh, possessive, I didn’t think you were that sort of gal, were there signs?”

That did the trick, Blake’s eyebrows rose in surprise and she shook her head before smiling far too sweetly for Yang’s comfort, trailing a hand down the bicep she’d now captured in her grasp.

“Well, _babe_ , I guess you should have thought a bit harder and checked what you were getting into before falling into something you are clearly _not_ prepared for, I guess you’ll have to try a bit harder to keep up.” The trailing hand kept up its motion, doing its best to keep Yang’s attention but failing as she stared directly into Blake’s eyes. “I want people to know what’s mine.”

 _Honestly_? They’d joked about Weiss, but it might just be Yang’s brain melting at this point in time, judging from the static in her ears; _boy_ , was she glad she didn’t have a dick right now or else she’d be in a very awkward situation. The static was cut through though, by Weiss’ guffaw.

Her first witnessed guffaw was, in true Weiss fashion, obnoxious yet oddly refined, in the same way beautiful super cars were ruined by terrible, ugly, personally offensive paint jobs.

It was a rich person’s laugh, in other words.

“Oh my _god_ , we know who wears the pants in this relationship then.” Ruby then chimed in with an awful whip sound and a _very helpful_ “Which I’d like to say I knew would happen.”

Those two were really leaning into the whole “ _BFF_ ” thing and this scary synchronicity was just the tip of the iceberg. A manicured finger dramatically wiped an imagined tear away from an eye as Weiss finally stopped laughing at an unimpressed Yang and bemused Blake, although she wasn’t getting away easy from the snickering girl.

“And those pants were woven entirely from the purple prose of Ninjas of Love!”

The team had never seen her laugh this hard before, which was now getting a bit scary, not that Blake and Yang could focus on anything other than being called out so thoroughly. Still, she soldiered on, undeterred, “Oh thank you for that laugh, I take back _everything_ I said about this being a bad idea- this is great!”

Weiss’ unrelenting happiness was beginning to both grate on the nerves of the rest team and unnerve them when Blake decided to defend herself.

“That, uh, was not from Ninjas of Love.”

 _Badly_ , defend herself.

“Oh,” a white eyebrow rose in challenge, “Was it from Passionate Plundering Pirates or Cocky Cowboys or—”

In the small pause she took to try and think up a new, possibly fake, possibly real, book title, Ruby jumped in. Or tried to.

“Or… or… wait, what’s sexy again?”

Yang chuckled and reached out to ruffle her sister’s hair, missing of course, due to her far superior reflexes but in the end the sudden movement had much the same effect on Ruby’s hair.

“I don’t know if I’m happy or disappointed you couldn’t think up _any_ sort of smutty book title, I know it’s not your thing but come _on_ , Blake has a small library in our room.”

The girl in possession of said library was desperate to move the conversation anywhere that didn’t involve her books, which Yang was kind of sad about- Blake looked good when she was flustered.

“Cocky Cowboys sounds like a gay porno, Weiss.”

 _Oh_. Okay. So Blake was flustered by her private book collection but not, apparently, by talking about possible porn titles in public. No, not just in public, in a _school_. In _their_ school.

“I think you’ll find it sounds more like one of your books, Blake.”

They were going there huh, interesting, definitely _not_ the topic of lunch conversation Yang would have picked, but the bickering pair of Team RWBY did what they pleased. _Again_ , in a lunch hall, _again_ in their school. They truly were blessed with the sort of incredible timing that only (or pseudo only) children were blessed with, which meant that the big sister of the team would have to step in to bring back some decorum to the proceedings.

“Okay let’s stop picking on Blake love of choice romantic novels-”

Weiss, never one to pass up an opportunity, quickly spoke up.

“How chivalrous Yang, coming to your _girlfriend’s_ aid, maybe you should try harder to make this whole thing more believable in public and she won’t have to resort to those sorts of books.”

Well, if that’s how Weiss wanted to play it, Yang was most certainly not going to miss a couple rounds in the proverbial spar.

“Let’s stop picking on Blake… and _start_ talking about a certain Schnee’s hidden talent for naming porn films.” Said girl went pink and scowled at her but was only met with Yang’s stuck out tongue to back up her point. Ruby wasn’t going to be much help either in this situation, judging from the way her head was in her hands; sometimes Yang felt bad that she had to deal with three older teammates but in this case making fun of Weiss took top priority. Which was incredibly easy when she did stuff like-

“Most erotica titles are alliterative, have at least one pun in them and involve some sort of fantasy job role; it doesn’t take a lot of effort to come up with them.”

Yang shared a look with Blake, the pair trying not to let their grin turn evil. And failing miserably.

“Nuh-uh-uh you are not getting out of this _that_ easily, we absolutely need to know: is this a talent you were born with or do you have a lot of hands on experience.”

Yang couldn’t help herself, that innuendo was too much to bear as she burst out in a cackle. Honestly, Blake had one of the sharpest tongues she’d ever encountered and when she got to use it was never going to be fun for the other side. In this case, the other side was Weiss, who fixed her with a withering glare.

“I hate you Blake, I truly, deeply hate you.”

Said girl smugly popped a grape in her mouth before replying with a sickly smile. (Which was _hot_ , Yang should _not_ have found that so attractive.)

“You know you love me Weiss.”

Like the majority of their team’s discussions (arguments) they were interrupted by forces outwith their control- this time the bell, so the team had to pack up and move on to their afternoon classes.

“Wait, Ruby, how did you know I would be the,” Blake rolled her eyes pre-emptively at the term, “ _Pants wearer_ in this… thing.”

Ruby Rose, the sweetest girl in Beacon, a girl who couldn’t even think up a decent parody porn title not five minutes before, plastered the biggest shit eating on her face as she turned to her trailing teammates.

“Oh, Yang’s never been in an actual relationship where she was not a complete mess, you guys have only seen her here at Beacon where she thinks she’s a BNOC…” The leader paused momentarily, scrunching her face up in thought, “Well I suppose we are _all_ technically Big Names On Campus, but that’s besides the point: You’ve only seen flirty, in control Yang because she wasn’t that bothered.” She pointed dramatically at her sister, who was now regretting an awful lot of things she’d done in the past.

“Now you get to see her when she actually cares about what people think!”

For the second time that day (and ever) Weiss burst into a fit of laughter at the expressions of her teammates and the general revelations going on this here day; Yang silently wished to melt through the floor so she’d never have to deal with said revelations. Blake was now having a field day with them, threading her arm through Yang’s.

“Aw, Yang you care? I’m flattered.”

“I hate you Ruby.”

Yang’s muttering did nothing to dampen Ruby’s spirit or her grin.

“You know you love me, sis.”

Weiss took one look at the rest of her team and decided to rub salt in Yang’s wound.

“She clearly got that from you Yang, you brought this on yourself.

_That Afternoon: In Between Classes, Beacon Courtyard_

Sometimes it was difficult having a hot fake girlfriend but spending every waking moment with her was not one of the difficulties. Nor was it actually part of her girlfriend duties, it was exactly what she would have done normally as they walked between classes. Which then turned it into one of the difficulties she was actually facing. Along with the seemingly ever present attention of Team CRDL, who were currently skulking about some distance behind them.

Weiss’ words echoed in her head as she got stuck on one question: _how do you upgrade a close friendship to a public relationship without literally spending half your time macking on Blake?_

Not that she was that opposed to that course of action, it was just the way Blake was most likely to find out about her true feelings and that wasn’t something she was ready to ready to face just yet.

Catching the looks CRDL were not very subtly aiming at them, Yang decided to give them something to look at, throwing her arm loosely around Blake’s shoulders while sticking her tongue out at the now grumpy looking boys behind them. Feeling the weight, Blake turned her head to give her an enquiring look.

“May I ask what I did to deserve being used as your armrest?”

The short tone did little to move the arm, in fact Yang only tightened her grip a little bit and smiled.

“I’ve always wanted to do this. You’re shorter than me and I figured that while we’re _dating_ , I should make the most of being able to do this without you killing me,” she pondered for a second, “Well, maiming me, I like this arm and I’d like to keep it- at least a little bit longer.”

Blake preened at the half-compliment, half admission of fear

“Good to know I haven’t lost my threatening touch- and as your girlfriend I _definitely_ can’t let you lose that arm.” _That_ was an interesting line of thought especially coupled with the flirty tone, but Yang couldn’t even begin to continue it before Blake spoke again, “I’m sure it’s pretty handy.”

That stopped her still, not quite able to believe what her ears just heard, her arm falling from Blake’s shoulders as she kept walking but quickly stopped and turned upon noticing Yang had been left behind. Her face scrunched up adorably as she replayed the conversation in her head. Then her eyes widened in realisation, just as Yang bounded towards her.

“ _Yang_ …”

But it didn’t help as the exuberant pun master (Yang’s preferred title, much to her team’s displeasure) literally swept her off her feet.

“You are _so_ attractive right now,” she carefully placed her partner back down on the ground and smirked, “I guess I really have been rubbing off on you.” The girl in question blushed and Yang honestly could not resist such an easy set up, “Down girl- what _have_ those books been teaching you- _oof!_ ”

Blake followed up the half-hearted punch with covering her face with her hands before planting it in the taller girl’s shoulder.

“Oh my god Yang, _stooop,_ please stop saying that! You did it before the fight as well- please use _literally any other phrase!_ I can’t take it anymore!”

It was now Yang’s turn to turn red as Blake seemed intent on burying her way into her shoulder and the closeness was uncomfortably nice, which made no sense but, in her defence, she wasn’t exactly thinking straight. _Heh, thinking straight._ Still, as nice as it was that they were finally getting over the awkwardness of the whole situation and going back to their usual closeness, with a little extra on the side.

“By the way, why are you now so into holding me like this? Not that I’m objecting- _much_ , but still- you didn’t answer my question.”

_You mean besides my sweaty palms? Besides the fact that I can’t get enough of being close to you?_

“CRDL were looking this way and I couldn’t resist showing off a bit,” They shared an evil grin, “Plus we’d probably do something like that anyway- method acting.” If only she knew how eager Yang was to get into this character. Blake looked contemplative as she thought over the reason and then she got _that_ look on her face; the _look_ being the one that Weiss hated, Ruby was extremely wary of and Yang loved.

The look that meant something very fun or very illegal was going to happen. Or maybe both.

“CRDL were watching?”

Yang nodded, which she hoped Blake could feel.

“Are they still watching?”

A quick turn of the head to check they were still behind them.

“Yep.”

The word was barely out of her mouth before an arm slipped around her waist and she was drawn in even closer to the girl under her arm- Yang couldn’t help the yelp that escaped her- but she quickly adapted and adjusted her arm and it was all good. More than good. This was a far more comfortable position than the slightly over extended way they were before as Blake, for lack of a better word, snuggled even further into her side and hummed.

“You’re _so warm_ Yang.”

 _Yeah, my semblance is fire Blake, no shit I’m warm_... is what she would have said, if she could think coherently in the moment; instead she let out a small _“Yeah”_ and simply hugged her back, relishing the rare closeness Blake was affording her. They had been partners for over a year and a half and of course, with the Rose-Xiao Long sisters on her team, Blake (and Weiss) had been given an in-depth tour of their brand of affection, but Yang still felt trepidation whenever she decided to initiate serious physical contact. It was a double-edged sword; she may have craved the smallest touch but in the stolen moments, on the lazy days in the sun or in the room listening to the rain pelt the windows as they studied and joked together, Yang couldn’t help but want more. The brush of their hands, the playful taps, the stroke of her hair were never enough, none of them ever quite what she wanted.

What did she want? And why couldn’t she reach out and take it? Why couldn’t she spend lazy days with Blake draped across her, purring in the sunlight. Oh yeah, the purring was a new thing, but since Blake was doing it in that exact moment it was all Yang could think about. She hadn’t quite worked out how to bring it up, in particular bring up how much more she wanted it to happen, so she savoured the moments she got.

As if predicting Yang’s queries, probably from the errant brush of her fingers across one feline ear, Blake quietly spoke up.

“I’ve spent way too long trying to run from my faunus heritage, well,” she shrugged a bit, “Even when I was fighting for our rights I think I had so much self-loathing inside me, it wasn’t healthy… I think now’s about the time I should start to embrace it.” She turned her head to look up at Yang, smiling gently as she spoke, “And I thought I might as well embrace it around someone who I know won’t make fun of me for it.”

This was a milestone. Blake rarely acknowledged her faunus heritage outside of abstract conversations about the plight of the Faunus as a group and never as something that made her unique. Never about the parts of her that made her different from the rest of them.

It called for the only way Yang truly knew how to express love, bringing her other arm around to envelope the vulnerable girl in a hug that few would want to escape from and no one probably could anyway. She leant backwards, to make sure Blake could see the genuine emotion on her face.

“I’m honoured you feel safe with me and your faunus heritage is just a part of you. I love all parts of you,” Blake shyly tried to glance down but was stopped by Yang cupping her face, “I’m serious, I’d do anything to keep you safe and to stop you from getting hurt. You are my friend and I couldn’t imagine my life without you. _All_ of you.”

The world had narrowed down to just the pair of them with their hearts bared and eyes locked on each other, as time seemed to stop to let them fully soak in the exchange. Blake reached up to pull the hand cupping her face away and hold it loosely in her grasp, squeezing it for emphasis as she spoke.

“Thank you, Yang, I don’t know if you know how much that means to me, but… it means a lot.”

They stood for a moment, smiling at each other in the late afternoon sunshine that bathed the world in a golden light as it filtered through the trees surrounding them. Yang’s smile turned mischievous as she brushed an errant leaf from Blake’s shoulder and leaned in to whisper in her ear, enjoying how she missed a breath.

“And don’t worry, I can still make fun of you for a whole bunch of other things,” she drew back and winked for effect, “Low hanging fruit is _not_ my style.”

Blake pushed away with a mock huff.

“I was trying to show how much I trust you and you just say there’s other things to insult me for, _wow_ , I’m so touched by your restraint.”

They were still holding hands, so she had the opportunity to keep her close and flutter her eyelids at the backhanded compliment.

“I do have _some_ tact. Really you set yourself up for some serious teasing the moment I realised you were a cliché loving sap, the ammunition could fill a whole one of your ‘ _Romance_ ’ novels.”

Yang couldn’t help the goofy grin that appeared on her face as Blake desperately tried not to smile back at her and to keep up her annoyed façade.

“ _Urgh_ , I hate you.”

The grin only got wider.

“No, you don’t!”

A hand shot out to grab hers to pull her along as Blake grumpily stormed off.

“Yes. Yes, I do, and I _will_ break up with you if we don’t get to class on time!”

It was all Yang could do to stifle her laughter as she was dragged along by the red-faced girl, riding high on the conversation they’d just had, straight out of one of her daydreams all the way down to the cute scrunch of Blake’s nose.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I apologise deeply with how long this took to come out, hopefully there should be a much shorter wait for the next chapter. The one after it is definitely written so we'll see.
> 
> In my defense, my second semester of my year abroad was intense and then I traveled for over a month around North America and went to Cuba for a bit so there wasn't much time for me to write in the last couple of months. But I'm back home and hopefully ready to get more of this out.


	6. Chapter 6

_The Next Day_

The rest of Team RWBY and the entirety of JNPR soon began to notice a marked difference in the way the black and yellow pair were acting around each other: closer, more in sync, more… touchy feely was the best way Ruby could describe it. Something had happened in the past 24 hours. Or maybe they were just getting into it. Really into it. A bit _too_ into it in her sisterly opinion.

Ruby had to admit: They were _way_ more believable now. Whereas before the two seemed to have to remember to pretend to fake date they now seemed to have their hands glued together and they hugged _constantly_. Honestly, Blake was muscling in on _her_ hugging time and Weiss just wasn’t a very good replacement for her sister. If Blake and Yang had been good friends before they were doing their utmost to convince everyone they had upgraded their relationship.

Clearly the pair had taken Weiss’ advice to heart. Not that Weiss had seemed to have much more advice than hold hands…

Luckily Blake and Yang had more experience in doing the dating thing than their teammates, so they settled into a routine of doing various romantic things for each other that came tinted with a sarcastic or melodramatic edge. A chair would be pulled out with a flourish and thanked with a flutter of eyelashes; a tea would be bought and given; a spoonful of food would be shared and appreciated with a noise that Ruby never needed to hear. It seemed like Yang wasn’t ready to hear it either, judging from the way she’d frozen and completely lost her train of thought as Blake savoured the bit of cake.

At some point in the day the two had started testing out pet names which had turned them into the definition of a sickly-sweet couple. Ruby swore that Blake liked them, judging from the blushes that appeared when Yang said something particularly adorable. Or funny. Or innuendo laden.

Okay, Blake seemed to be enjoying it a lot.

Weiss was enjoying it less. Somehow almost less than Ruby, who was related to one half of the loved-up couple.

“Well if I wasn’t diabetic before I certainly am now. You two are disgusting.”

In a scary display of partner synchronicity, Blake and Yang turned and gave matching smirks, the latter’s morphing into a sickly smile as she grabbed her partner’s hand.

“I don’t get it Weiss, I thought we were supposed to be dialling this shit up? Or else how will anyone ever know we are deeply in _looovveeee_?”

Weiss was stony faced as she took in the pair in front of her and then turned back to her own partner, clearly expecting sympathy or back up or something that Ruby was not in the position to give her. Instead, Ruby bit down on her cookie and tried to ignore the kissy faces Yang was sending to Blake, who now had her head in a book and was not rising to the bait. The kissy faces were then directed at Weiss, who was even less enthusiastic when the aforementioned “ _lovey dovey”_ stuff was aimed at her.

Which meant damage control time for Ruby.

“Realistically, Weiss, this is not a time for subtlety, we kinda need to get the message across as quickly and efficiently as possible,” She paused, trying not to think too hard about the insinuations behind her next words, “And judging from the rumours going around… I think half the school has been waiting for something like this to happen. They love a good partner relationship. But it does mean that it’s not that big a deal, those rumours aren’t exactly flying all over the place.”

Weiss looked petulant that Ruby had somehow managed to provide a logical argument against her emotional reasoning, backing up the admittedly childish display coming from Yang. Which was still happening, like she was trying to get Weiss to explode.

Then, instead of going high, Weiss went low and started making kissy faces right back at Yang. Ruby hid her face in her hands as the loud noises overwhelmed any other noises from the cafeteria- this was not going to help anything. They already got enough weird looks after Glynda made that very unsubtly pointed announcement about Beacon not having the budget to clean up students’ property damage off campus- they didn’t need to add the possibility of Weiss joining in with Blake and Yang.

Even if it would most probably, _definitely_ get the message across to CRDL.

Weiss and Yang’s display was getting louder by the second and Ruby was not looking forward to trying to break up the situation and then their fourth teammate joined in, looking far too smug for her own good.

“I bet she tastes like honey.”

It was bad on its own, but it was followed by a look that could only be described as hungry and made Yang seem far too interested in Blake’s lips. The temperature around the table seemed to rise.

That was the last straw for Ruby, even Blake had betrayed her. There were so many things she never needed to know about her teammates, least of all her sister- in fact she didn’t even want to _think_ about Blake and Yang being involved in anything like that. She slapped her hands over her ears and hummed to block out the hysterical giggles of Blake and Yang, finally having said something too ridiculous for them to keep a straight face.

_That Afternoon, The Library_

Blake _had_ been hoping to catch up on some of her reading for Oobleck’s paper- by catch up she meant get ahead, Team RWBY was overdue for a misadventure and she’d rather not double up on world saving missions and homework. She was tired enough as it is without having to manage detective work on top of Beacon’s ridiculous attempt to snow them under with coursework, she doubted they were going need half this stuff at the end of it all.

Naturally, the world felt like rewarding her forward-thinking responsibility by blessing her with an terrible distraction because the world was an awful and cruel place to live in. Filled with people who couldn’t take no for an answer.

“I see your gal pal isn’t around right now, so how about you and I get down to the business of sorting you out with a proper date?”

She should have expected it. Cardin hadn’t approached her alone yet, she’d already dealt with the other three and it was natural that he would try his chances when Yang wasn’t around. His tone was haughty and entitled, like it always was, and he had made the interesting decision to try and box her in. Blake counted to five in her head, took a deep breath and plastered on her most obnoxiously bright smile as she turned to face him.

“Oh, do you have someone in mind? So kind of you to help your friend out.”

That stung him, it was disappointingly easy to do if you knew where to aim and Blake had _always_ had an incredible talent for the details.

“I meant me.”

The words were ground out through gritted teeth and furrowed eyebrows, his short fuse already seemingly gone from the get go but Blake wasn’t afraid of explosions or a few insults. She was on Team RWBY for god’s sake, explosions and biting tongues had been there from the before the beginning. She tried her best to look sympathetic as she spoke with barely contained mirth.

She assumed she did not look sympathetic.

“Oh yeah, I forgot you don’t have any friends. Or have you given up and upgraded your lackeys to pals now?”

His face was slowly colouring now, as if he had expected any other outcome than her to immediately agree with his incredible pick-up lines.

Did he do this often?

That question gave her pause: Did this work for him? Had Cardin asked people out and then proceeded to get a date with him? Were those hypothetical people okay?

In honour of the hypothetical people who has perhaps mistakenly said yes to the boy in front of her, Blake decided to make it very clear how emphatically she did not want to even be in his presence, never mind date him.

“Cardin, even if I didn’t have a girlfriend,” the word still gave her shivers to say, even when deflecting the unwanted interests of a douchebag, “Even if I was the most desperate girl on the planet, I’m talking last man on earth situation, I still wouldn’t want to touch you past knocking you down a peg or two.”

Blake hadn’t realised it was possible for someone’s face to go that red, but maybe Cardin had some weird semblance or something.

“What did you just say? You ungrateful _bitch.”_ Cardin had backed her closer to the wall than she was comfortable with, the price of showing restraint instead of giving into the overwhelming temptation to knock him flat on his ass again. Blake was just about to thoroughly illustrate how hard it would be for him to walk after she was through with him when the sound of footsteps reached her ears.

“Hey, Cardin- shove off my girlfriend or I’ll show you exactly how hard I can punch you,” Yang leaned in over his shoulder, close enough to whisper in his ear, “I hope you aren’t too attached to your teeth.”

She moved around him to snake her arm around Blake’s waist with a fake sounding chuckle and punched his shoulder, as if it had all been some hilarious joke that everyone had been in on, everyone but Cardin anyway. Blake had never seen anyone’s eyes go as wide as his were now and Yang wasn’t even done yet; keeping her voice light she continued elaborating on her threat as if she was discussing the weather, or a slightly interesting book she had found.

“I mean, of course teeth aren’t digestible, hard to swallow but you might not choke on them, so you will see them again... eventually. But there would be a lot of collateral damage,” Yang waved a hand around his face, “Collateral damage in the face area. And I _really_ don’t want to be the one to lower your dating chances from _slim_ ,” she pinched her fingers together, “To _non-existent_ ,” she squashed an imaginary bug with her fingers, “So how about you run off like a good little boy and stop harassing girls a million miles out your league?”

By the time he had scampered off back around the corner he had appeared from Yang had cooled down enough to turn to her girlfriend- _partner Blake, just partner_ \- and let out a shaky breath.

“I’m sorry, I don’t know what happened there. I just got really angry. Like, wow he’s never made me that angry before, he wasn’t here for long, was he? I hope he didn’t bother you, I mean, if he did I suppose I could make good on the threat with the teeth thing-”

Blake couldn’t help herself, pulling Yang’s babbling mouth down to her own, placing a small peck on her quickly stilling lips.

“Thank you, Yang. I could have handled it, but I appreciate you looking out for me.”

The girl in question blushed and rubbed the back of her neck.

“Hey, what are friends- _uh,_ _girlfriends_ \- for? It’s like girl code 101, right along with becoming best friends with drunk girls in the bathroom and carrying home your actual friends when they’re too drunk and then gossiping about your nights and then practising kissing with them because that shit’s hard when you start out-”

Yang had started to do that thing where she rambled off on a tangent; _honestly_ sometimes the family resemblance was hard to see but this was one undeniable trait that linked her with Ruby. It was just as cute when Yang did it, especially since she was usually so blunt and to the point.

“Wait, _what_ was that last one?”

That got Yang to shut up quickly and become completely unable to meet her eye.

“Absolutely nothing you need to think or know about.”

Blake smirked and pulled Yang around to face her, running her finger along her out of place collar.

“I think I should start to hear about some of your past conquests, you sound like you have some interesting stories.”

Yang grabbed her wrists to stop her fidgeting with her uniform, a light blush covering her nose

“Now, I wouldn’t exactly call them _conquests_ , most of them were perfectly normal relationships or flings.”

Blake couldn’t help the quirk of her eyebrow at her still captured wrists, asking a question she knew she wanted answered but didn’t know if she was ready to deal with the consequences that would follow.

She decided she was.

“Yes, ‘ _most of them’,_ but if you treated them like this I _definitely_ have a few questions.”

It was Yang’s turn to smirk as she pulled lightly on Blake’s arms, dragging them ever so slightly closer and into the relative shadow of the nearby bookshelf.

“Oh, so you want to hear about my dating history, while you’re still so _awfully_ tight lipped about yours?”

The question was harmless, it was fair to expect Yang to jokingly ask something like that in return for her joking question. It still didn’t stop Blake from freezing. The smile fell from Yang’s lips as she realised something was wrong, dropping her wrists like they’d burnt her and the guilt of ruining their good mood washed over Blake.

Yang was the first one to apologise; it seemed like she was always ready to fall over herself to apologise for Blake’s hang ups, as if she had been the one to knock every single one onto the wall comprising her younger years.

It shouldn’t be on Yang to deal with her partner’s nightmare of a past.

“I’m sorry Blake, I fucked up there. It was only a shit joke. I know it’s a sensitive subject, I wouldn’t force you to talk about stuff like that.”

She nodded and breathed deeply, wishing she could turn off the reflex or rewind time to the moment they were happy.

“I know Yang, I’m sorry I do this, I’m sorry I just- urgh!”

The words never came to her when she needed them, all those books she’d read and she still couldn’t string together enough words to tell the closest friend she’d ever had the luck of knowing how sorry she was for being like this. But Yang, sweet, giving and compassionate, already seemed to know.

“There’s nothing to be sorry about, you know that, I know that. So, we move on from this moment and you remember that I have you. And then,” She rubbed her thumb across the back of Blake’s hand, “When you want to speak about it, remember that you have me.”

Yang enveloped her in a hug, the solid warmth of her body grounded her in the moment.

“I got you and sorry partner, but I’m never letting you go.”

There was an unsaid line there, a blank that Blake knew how to fill in with such ease that it scared her, how Yang bared her vulnerable side to her while she just shut hers away and froze like a coward.

“What did I do to deserve you?” Blake murmured the question into Yang’s collar.

There was a muffled response, “I could ask you the same question.”

It was Yang this time, the one to initiate the kiss, meant to placate any unsaid uncertainties that maybe have been left between them. It was gentle, her chin cupped and raised by a strong hand, and an action that looked well practised and almost thoughtless to the outside eye, or well it was supposed to be.

 Until Blake escalated it. She would never know what exactly came over her at that point in time, between the stacks of the library, only that she really, _really_ enjoyed it.

Because now the kiss wasn’t quick, it wasn’t thoughtless, it wasn’t careless.

It was a Kiss.

Full stop, capital K. Even the kiss in the dorm felt tame compared to it as Blake leant in, wrapping her hands around her partner as she dragged her towards the nearest wall for support. If either of them could remember they were in public they didn’t care, which was obvious from the way Yang's hands slid further and further south and one of Blake’s untucked Yang’s shirt to run itself up the boxer’s ridiculous abs. She couldn’t tell who exactly was making the almost sinful noises she could hear but with how attached they were she supposed it didn’t matter who was to blame.

Then there was a cough from somewhere outside their bubble.

And then the source of the cough spoke.

“Have some decency girls.”

Oh… Weiss was gonna have a field day with this one once they were done telling this story.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fun fact: I got told to ‘Have some decency’ in a club by a bouncer… it was also the second time she’d told me off. I left the club and went to McDonald’s instead of possibly embarrassing myself any further. Rebounding makes you do weird stuff.
> 
> The next chapter coming up is one of my favourites: Blake and Yang get advice from Weiss and Ruby and maybe some real feels are involved.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Yang and Blake annoy their teammates and are peak relatable useless wlws.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Me, updating within two weeks of the last chapter: Lmao I'm wild.

_The Next Day, Team RWBY’s Dorm_

For having spent an above average amount of time apparently glued to each other’s faces, Ruby was feeling _some_ tension between Blake and Yang.

They'd spent the day tripping over sentences and feet around each other, awkwardly avoiding lengthy eye contact or any eye contact at all. Ruby knew about what had happened the day before, she and Weiss would have had to be blind not to notice the embarrassed and slightly ruffled state they'd arrived back to their dorm yesterday and it had been their duty as friends to get the gossip out of them. Even if the gossip was about them and had happened all but five minutes before.

The pair had been well in sync as they related their encounter with Cardin, with Ruby providing much appreciated reactions to Yang’s well delivered threat, but when it came to the aftermath they’d faltered and played off the kiss until they had to finally admit the truth.

At the time Ruby had passed it off as another one of their fake kisses (albeit one with no witnesses barring the librarian whom she severely doubted cared about their relationship) but today it was becoming increasingly clear that it had changed something between them. Or something had been realised. At one point they had both reached for the same book and their hands barely touched but they both leapt like Nora had sent 1000 volts directly through the one millimetre of skin that had managed to make contact.

Okay, so maybe she was feeling a _lot_ of tension between them.

Every so often the sisters were left to their own devices in their dorm, when Blake and Weiss found themselves alone on their trips to the library as the sisters mumbled out vague excuses for not wanting to come along to Weiss’ notoriously strict study sessions.

_Own devices_ on this particular day meant that Yang was moping and Ruby was being unwillingly dragged into it.

“This is killing me Ruby! I was perfectly happy pining for Blake from afar! Now I have to be all lovey dovey with her and I can’t… I can’t do this.”

Ruby’s head shot up from her own bed, half startled by the companionable silence being broken and half by the actual content of her sister’s exclamation. She tilted her head and squinted, hoping to show how confused she was.

“Wait, I thought you wanted this?”

The glare she received at her question indicated that was _not_ the issue right now.

“No. I want Blake to be with me for real, not some fake acting shit! She kissed me on the cheek at one point, just because Sky and Russel walked around the corner and I almost collapsed.”

She sighed and fell bonelessly back on to her bed.

“Never mind what happened yesterday… I’ve never been so mortified.”

A genuinely despondent big sister wasn’t what Ruby had wanted when she had agreed to Weiss’ plan and it hadn’t really come up in their discussion after the lunch when they’d decided it couldn’t really hurt. Maybe she had slightly underestimated the true extent of Yang’s crush on her partner.

“I don’t even know if she likes girls like that Ruby.”

That made her snort, a genuinely uncontrollable reaction to someone speaking pure nonsense; Ruby had both seen and heard the aftermath of “The Incident” yesterday (thankfully missing the incident itself) and boy, was that a story. Even Weiss had found it somewhat amusing before the almost public indecency was brought up.

“Judging from what you said about the kiss yesterday she likes _something_ about you.”

Ruby had never seen her sister look so torn between following her feelings and maintaining the status quo; she always took charge and made decisions and stuck to them. Some people called her hot-headed or impulsive but Ruby knew her sister would rather take action and live to regret it rather than agonise over it. She said she liked to “go with the flow” but it came from a deep seated need to be completely in control- she’d either force the decision or completely avoid making them.

At least not making the decision meant she couldn’t be blamed for the results.

Recently she’d been taking the second option and Ruby could see it was killing her emotionally. From experience, a lot more than she personally ever wanted, she knew that Yang never really messed around with her feelings- if she liked them she let them know, answer be damned. Not that many people tended to reject her but still… she took the leap.

This whole thing with Blake was so unlike her, so-

“What’s different about Blake?” Yang snorted into her pillow. “You’ve never had this sort of problem before.”

“ _What’s different with Blake?_ she asks, as if she can’t guess, as if there’s a not a million reasons not to.”

Wow. A mocking repetition of Ruby’s words? A blatantly, 100% negative and sarcastic answer? It was worse than she could have ever expected.

She crawled up to the head of the bed and manoeuvred herself under her sister’s head, trying to replicate what Yang had always done for her over the years, at moments of self-doubt or high emotions. This had always been her area of expertise, Ruby had even caught Yang falling into similar habits with Weiss, which was a bizarre sight the first couple of times.

Yet no one ever returned the gesture; it had never felt necessary or wanted, Yang wasn’t one for talking about her feelings or her issues with her family.

Which made it all the more surprising when Blake had revealed, after a day of uncharacteristic quiet, that Yang had given her a whistle stop tour of her early life and that it had explained a lot about her partner. Ruby should have known then, really. Yang actually talking about her mother with Blake showed an incredible amount of trust in her.

Damn, what would Yang do to help her here? She was already stroking her hair…

“Tell me all the reasons then- and I'll tell you why they're all dumb.”

Another snort.

“They're not dumb, or else I would have already done something.”

Stubborn as usual.

“I'm pretty sure you once told me- actually you told me many times- that sisters exist to tell you when you do dumb things. I think sending yourself into a depressive spiral over a girl can be classed as _dumb_.”

That one got a reaction out of her.

“It’s not _dumb_ ,” she repeated, muffled into the pillow. Ruby just waited it out.

Finally, Yang rolled over with a sigh, throwing her weight on top of her sister, which was far more uncomfortable now she was a wall of solid muscle but Ruby powered through. Despite the slight crushing sensation on her lower body, Ruby managed a gentle smile as she wiped away some of the mascara that had smudged while Yang’s face had been buried in the pillow. Her eyes were shiny with unshed tears as she spoke haltingly, carefully picking the best words to explain it all.

“Blake’s different… it’s not just a crush, not anymore. I thought I could live with it, but it’s been getting worse; I didn’t think anything could top watching her with Sun but surprise!” Her poor attempt at jazz hands almost hit Ruby in the face, but she continued on unaware, “You have it bad past Yang, hope you enjoy cold showers and guilty-”

There were some things that surpassed sisterly advice and the possible options for the end of that sentence could be was definitely one of them.

“Okay! Okay, I get the basics, no need to elaborate on that!”

Her older sister looked up at her with a mischievous smirk, its desired effect slightly ruined by the awkward angle.

“Why, Ruby- what did you think I was going to say?” The mirth in her voice was a complete 180 from her previous state and Ruby refused to make eye contact with the now surely grinning blonde. When she realised that Yang wasn't going to continue without her replying, she huffed, opened her mouth and looked down.

And stopped in her tracks.

Yang literally looked like a kicked puppy- actually, Ruby doubted Zwei could pull off that look.

“She's just so smart and pretty and funny and- fuck! Urgh, you know- Blake!”

Ruby did know Blake, but clearly not in the way Yang did; sure Blake was great, she loved books and didn't mind if Ruby didn't want to speak a lot and listened with a fond smile when she did. Like another big sister...

She could get behind that- two big sisters were obviously better than one.

“Why don’t you two get away tomorrow, like go on a date-” Ruby saw Yang’s grimace and changed tracks, “-a friend date. I know it’s been weird for you, both of you. Just go, hang out with her like normal. Don’t think about all the stuff going on up here.”

Her sister looked ready to argue but Ruby plastered her _No Nonsense Leader Ruby_ _Look_ on her face and her hours of practicing must have paid off because the fight left her with a long exhale and a look that admitted defeat.

“Fine, I guess not being at Beacon _would_ make it easier to talk...”

Ruby leapt from the bed with a grin, vague plan of action sorted and sister comforted in a double whammy of incredible leadership skills and advice giving. This was going on her CV once this was all over.

“Now, I’ll leave you to come up with some spectacular date ideas because I’ve got to go find Weiss since I absolutely do not get the most recent dust class.”

Her grin had dampened by the time she'd reached her back to pack her book and clearly Yang could see that, the way she swung back into older sister mode.

“Skipping two years of Signal means skipping two years of Dust 101, there needs to be some sort of karmic downside to you being a wünderkind- if only to make the rest of us to feel better.”

It was nice to have supportive and funny Yang back instead of mopey and heartbroken Yang, even if it meant opening herself back up to teasing. Ruby just grinned up at her sister.

“Yeah, yeah, laugh it up. I'm still your leader.”

She was almost out the door when Yang spoke again, quieter but more sincerely.

“Hey Ruby,” She paused on her way out of the room, “You’re really good at this comforting thing.”

A genuine smile came across her face as she looked up at her sister leaning off the precarious bed.

“Well I did learn from the best, sis.”

_The Exact Same Time, The Library_

As Blake’s afternoon of studying had been so rudely interrupted the day before she had felt it was worth the risk to study with the uptight heiress. And to apparently pick her brains about a situation she was having, something that Weiss had not signed up for, in fact, she expressly wished to avoid any situation involving the feelings of her teammates.

Yet here Blake was, involving her.

“I never took you for a fan of romcoms Weiss.”

The complete non-sequitur from any of their previous conversations took the girl in question by surprise, considering her and Blake had been quietly studying in the library together. Weiss shuffled through possible reasons that Blake could have brought up her taste in movies and found she couldn't piece together a reasonable connection from romcoms to _Dust and the Efficiencies of its Forms_. She turned to the interruption and spoke sharper than perhaps she meant to.

“Excuse me, what?”

Blake scowled at her, a look that would have been scary had Weiss not lived with Blake for the past year and a half and learned of her complete distaste for confrontation unless as a last resort. Kind of like a cat, if describing her as such wasn't seen as racist rather than apt.

“Romcoms- this whole fake dating thing is straight out of one of my books.”

Weiss sighed as she got back to her work: so, it was going to be one of _those_ conversations. She threw up a finger as she began counting.

“First of all: Not my fault, I was only throwing out ideas.” The second finger went up. “Secondly: This is not a romcom thing Blake, it was just the best way to get them off your backs, show you two were off the table and all that jazz.” The hand was waved dismissively in the air, the gesture not disrupting the flow of her writing one bit; her childhood might not have prepared her for romantic crises but she'd had multitasking down for a decade.

“You don’t mean this isn’t the exact plot to at least two of-” Blake cut herself off abruptly, obviously wanting to avoid talking about her not-so-secret reading habits with Weiss.

Who didn’t even look up from her paper as she finished her teammate’s sentence, “- at least two of your new collection of historical “ _romance_ ” books. It’s three, by the way, if you count _Lovers by the Cracked Moon_ ’s b-plot.” She looked up. “You honestly don’t think we haven’t read them? They're trashy, yes, but I've found them rather entertaining.” _And maybe a little bit informative_ , but her teammate didn’t need to know any more than the basics.

The bookworm’s renewed scowl at the descriptor still didn’t phase the heiress at all, Blake had a way of looking adorable rather than threatening when she glared at people. Believing they’d thankfully reached the end of their segue into “emotional chatter”, they both turned back to their work.

Well, Weiss, ever the diligent worker, did; Blake simply stared blankly at the page in front of her.

“Weiss,” her voice was uncharacteristically unsure, “What if, say, hypothetically I started to like Yang in a… more than friend way?”

That stopped her writing, there was being able to multitask and then there was whatever _this_ was.

“Well maybe it’s getting a _bit_ romcom-y then,” she threw her hands up in exasperation, “But how was I supposed to know you would actually _start feeling things_?”

Okay, they weren’t even going to touch on how bad that sounded, it was just kind of sad really. Weiss rubbed her forehead, this was going to be a _Conversation_. “What even happened? I thought you were friends.”

Blake didn’t even scowl this time, her vaguely pitying look was enough to make Weiss uncomfortable, even more so than any grimace the faunus could have worked up.

“People can be friends and be in a relationship Weiss.”

“ _Just_ friends, you need to explain why you're suddenly into her.”

The pointed question did the trick, as Blake reddened under Weiss’ interrogation and the lack of a snarky backhand set off even more alarm bells.

“I, uh, don't think it's as sudden as you think… it just took making out with her to realise that there might be something there.”

Again, Weiss sighed and massaged her temples.

“Like, for example, the other day she called me her girlfriend and then threatened to punch Cardin in the face and I-” She fiddled with the pen in front of her, frustratedly throwing it down as she tried to articulate her feelings, “I don’t know! It felt like something I wanted. It felt nice that _someone_ was willing to stand up for me! It felt good that she was willing to go to all that trouble for me. “

The explanation did not impress Weiss and she tried to communicate so with her own scowl.

“Punching people is her definition of fun, not trouble. Also,” She was unable to hide the judgement from her tone, “She threatened to punch a guy in the face and now you’re all weak at the knees? Honestly Blake, I thought _I_ was the one with issues.”

Blake was blasé as she shrugged in reply, “It’s not my fault she’s hot when she’s angry.”

The heiress groaned and held one hand up, cradling her forehead with the other. It was a common sight for her teammates as she learned how to deal with real people rather than servants; she had discovered real people were very exasperating and it took all her willpower to not be snide

“First of all, if that was a pun: leave, now. I’m not kidding, you don’t deserve my help. Secondly, please don’t start talking about what turns you on, I don’t know how to deal with that level of friendship. If you start waxing poetic about her butt I’ll stab you.”

Blake actually had the gall to laugh at that and reach over to grab her shoulder and squeeze it.

“Too bad. We’re there now, Yang’s got a fantastic butt. Friendship level up. Time to learn how to deal, socially-stunted-Schnee.”

The mood was lightened considerably by the joke at Weiss’ expense, as was the case in most situations she was an easy target for Blake, much to her chagrin. They still hadn’t solved her problem though… just avoided it, like Blake tended to do with most of her problems in life. Her knee jerk reaction to avoid problems always amazed Weiss, since she was so confident in her stances on so many issues and had surefootedly navigated her way through so many stressful situations but the moment her feelings got involved she lost all control.

“What do I _do_ though?”

Brought out of her thoughts by the pleading drone coming from the now face down on the table Blake, Weiss shook her head sadly, scribbling down a note in her book before turning her full attention back to the issues.

“You are barking up the wrong tree here Blake, I know we treat it as a joke but I literally have no reference point for healthy relationships except from my distant sister and my psuedo dad…” She couldn’t help but wince as she finished her train of thought, “Who is my butler.”

Blake also winced in sympathy.

“Weiss… every time I hear about your childhood I have an almost uncontrollable urge to call my parents and apologise for running off with a terrorist organisation as a teenager,” she narrowed her eyes, “I don’t like being reminded that _I_ was the bad one in my family.”

The pair were stuck in a sort of standoff, which tended to happen when they compared their pre-Beacon lives, where they each faced different challenges on the opposite sides of a historical feud they were symbolic heiresses to. Weiss relented this time, in the most teenage angst filled way possible, there were more important things on the line right now than massive social and political change.

“Well, I’m not exactly the _good_ one according to my family, just one of the few with a conscience, but yes, you’re a disappointment in a very different way.”

She still hadn't mastered the art of jokingly insulting people, judging by the way Blake flinched, even if she did smile after the fact.

“Oh, ice cold Weiss or should I say _Weiss_ \- _ow!_ ” Blake grabbed the spot where the book hit her shoulder, apparently Weiss hadn’t told them about her half decent throwing arm.

“You should not say _anything_ , _urgh_ of course you’re into Yang, you’re the only one who likes her puns, I should have seen this coming.”

Only an enigmatic smile met her exasperation, but it quickly dropped into a wry one as she realised the implications of the sentence. Weiss almost felt bad about calling her out, but she wasn’t known as the “blunt” and “insensitive” one on team RWBY and not put it good use _sometimes_. (Really though? She wasn’t ever coddled as a child so _excuse_ her for a lack of so called tact.)

Still, she hadn’t put her foot fully in it yet.

“Maybe you should just try telling her how you feel?”

Blake blanched at the suggestion – perfect, foot firmly planted in _it_.

“I- uh, think at this point I should just leave it, I can’t really go around fucking up my friendships – who knows how she would react. I don’t want to make things weird.”

Resisting the urge to smack her face off the table and knock herself unconscious until _one of them womanned up and told the other the truth_ , Weiss simply smiled tightly at the nervous looking girl and nodded in the least patronising way possible.

“Hmm, okay.”

The pair settled back into their routine of quietly working together, the soft scratching of their pens the only sound breaking the slightly awkward silence that blanketed them. Weiss kept running the conversation back in her mind and then running back the previous week’s events and trying to pinpoint the moment things had changed between Blake and Yang. She came up empty.

In her eyes nothing had changed between them- _Oh… that’s the problem._

Eventually Blake noticed there was a new person approaching their table, perked up as she realised who it was and began packing up her things to go to leave Weiss on her own to deal with the newcomer. Who turned out to be Ruby, finally acknowledging how useful it was to have heir to a Dust Megacorporation on her team when she was well behind the standard curriculum after her late night vigilantism got her propelled two years ahead. Late night vigilantism doesn't teach you dust formulas.

Slightly distracted by her partner’s whirlwind arrival, she almost missed the departure of her lovesick study buddy and definitely would have missed it had Blake not turned around to softly say one last thing.

“You know Weiss, even after all this time on the same team you continue to surprise me, I’m glad we worked things out - turns out we have more in common than I ever could have thought.”

The still seated girl smiled up at her and offered a small toast with her pen.

“To being the family disappointments?”

“Well I _guess_ that's definitely something we have in common, I _was_ trying to be sincere.”

With a fond eyeroll Blake left Weiss with a rather confused Ruby, who had both her eyebrows raised as her eyes flickered between the pair, clearly trying to extrapolate what their conversation was about from the brief and unusual exchange.

“What was _that_ about?”

“I think either something really good is going to happen soon. Either that or Blake is going to have a breakdown.”

Ruby nodded understandingly.

“Not if Yang spontaneously combusts first.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Turns out the feelings might be more mutual than you thought. Also, it’s okay Weiss, one day you’ll meet Ilia and Blake will have her turn to deal with the suffocating Useless Lesbianism that will ruin her life for a month until you remember this exact conversation and die inside.
> 
> I wish I could embed gifs into this for all of Ruby and Weiss’ reactions, especially Weiss’.
> 
> Next Chapter: Yang and Blake get away from it all- on a “totally not a date” date.
> 
> Hey all yous, not gonna be one of those folks who asks for reviews but all I wanna say is I love each and every one of them and they make me super happy. If you want to join in on making me happy, just like, quote your favourite bit of the chapter at me with a “Lmao Weiss is hilarious” because lets be real here, she is and she probs had your fave line of the chapter. Or prove me wrong and tell me something different.
> 
> Idk I’m a needy bitch who craves validation, take a minute and give it to me. It will also probs remind me to write, the next one is already gonna take a bit longer than this one but only because it’s gonna be looonngg.


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Blake and Yang decide they need a break from their fake relationship by going on a fake date.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Does anyone actually know if you can drive to Vale from Beacon? Because they do in this but I'm genuinely clueless about what the layout of Vale is, love the continuity of this show  
> Also I imagine a lot of Natasha Negovanlis’ outfits would work well as Blake’s so like… there’s a wee bit inspo for you. Blake Lively can be thanked for Yang’s.  
> Also lol yeah this chapter is 10k words long because I like writing them obliviously flirting duh.

_The Next Morning_

__

It was a lovely Saturday morning, a surprisingly quiet Saturday morning in Beacon terms and a _blissfully_ quiet Saturday morning in Team RWBY terms. It was the perfect start to a day for Blake to relax and get along with her reading that she’d been missing while the rest of her life decided to take a brief detour off the rails. The rails had been roughly put back in the same direction as they were before… if only with a little more baggage.

The day would have been better had it not been for the lingering awkwardness between her and Yang, since her talk with Weiss had just only served to confuse her more. She couldn't help but run through all the possible outcomes of just _telling_ Yang and then immediately backtrack on her thoughts. _Why ruin a good thing?_

Confrontation was not her style. Not when it could be avoided at least.

Blake had been sat reading the same page of her book for a solid minute when a shadow crossed her light, disrupting the intense focus she had on not managing to focus on the page. Yang swung herself down on the chair next to her, announcing her presence with a happy hum and bringing a dazzling smile to bear.

“Wanna get away from it all?”

Putting her completely unreadable book away (even more uninteresting and unreadable in the presence of her partner), Blake returned a genuine smile.

“More than anything.”

The silence spread out between them, comfortable, like the sun lazily making its way into a shadowed courtyard. Nothing could take away the good feelings that warmed her around Yang, who grinned awkwardly and ran a hand through her hair.

“I was thinking a, uh, date night - a _friend_ date night -for us to just chill away from everyone and everything at Beacon.” The words _And the pressures of fake dating your best friend_ didn't need to be said for Blake to understand the real reasons. “So where do you want to go- the world’s your oyster. Well Vale is.”

Blake couldn’t help it, she gagged at just the thought of-

“Definitely not oysters, they’re slimy and disgusting.”

“ _Okay_ , striking off all you can eat oyster places then,” Yang looked serious for a moment, pulling out her scroll, “Gonna have to find another aphrodisiac for you to eat.” The scandalised look that must have crossed her face set Yang off laughing before Blake realised she was joking. Well, probably joking. She had just about composed herself when Yang decided to up the ante again.

“You’re really missing out you know, everyone knows that oysters are the perfect demonstration of a date’s…”

She paused for a moment and scrunched up her face as she looked for the words that neither of them really needed to finish off the sentence. The gap had already been filled by any number of Blake’s books, never mind her own imagination-

“... mouth dexterity.”

Blake didn’t even have the time to blush before she collapsed forward onto the table in hysterical giggles, she had been expecting a vaguely suave innuendo but had been left with one of the funniest things her partner had ever said. Top five definitely. She looked up to see Yang blushing and grinning sheepishly at her.

“Of all the things you could have said: _mouth dexterity_?”

This time it was Yang trying to look annoyed while fighting a smile, she only managed to huff and cross her arms but still didn’t look remotely threatening.

“Oh, all right, don’t keep harping on about it, I didn’t want to be too vulgar okay? And my mind was just… _really_ deep in the dirt.”

If it had been anywhere near hers then Blake didn’t blame her for not saying them out loud, she barely wanted to be reminded of exactly where her imagination had gone, never mind Yang’s. Now she was just picturing things that were not appropriate anywhere outside of her bed, not really breakfast conversation material… unless it was maybe a _really_ good morning.

Nope. Not going there. Especially not with Yang right in front of her.

They must have looked a sight, avoiding each other’s eyes while blushing furiously, desperately trying not to think about the possible ways of demonstrating… anything like that. Blake decided to try and remove the images from her head, but it was proving extremely challenging.

“Let’s not talk about mouth dexterity anymore.”

“Agreed.”

Blake searched her mind for anything to change the conversation.

“I could go for steak, there’s a great place downtown.” She paused and looked Yang up and down, “You’ll have to dress classy.”

It did exactly what she wanted, Yang acted suitably dramatically affronted at the slight. There was no doubt that when she put her mind (and body) to it, there were few occasions that Yang couldn’t find a way to pull off the required look. And pull it off with an amount of flair that for most other people they would end up looking obnoxious, yet Yang just made it… work.

“I am _offended_ , I’m always classy. I think you’ll find I’m the epi-tome of class.”

Blake couldn't help but smirk and roll her eyes at her antics.

“Saying you’re the epitome of class _usually_ works better when you pronounce ‘epitome’ correctly.”

As Yang was in the habit of doing, she lightly pushed Blake’s shoulder away, unbalancing her just enough to show her displeasure with her smart-ass comments. Sometimes she just saw the opportunity and _had_ to take them.

“Shove off bookworm.” Blake did the mature and classy thing and stuck her tongue out. “Just for that I’ll out dress you- I was _gonna_ let you be the prettiest one tonight but I guess I’ve got something to prove.”

It was her turn to be affronted, playfully of course. Playfully was the baseline of their insulting humour, affectionately insulting your friends is what you did to keep them grounded.

“ _Let me be the prettiest one_? Someone has a big head.”

Yang sighed overdramatically, a full body affair that ended with her resting her head on the hand propped up by her elbow on the table, staring rather intently at Blake.

“I mean, you’re gorgeous like, 99% of the time provided you get a good amount of sleep and aren’t chasing down terrorist organisations, let a gal win sometimes. You make it look effortless and I’m exhausted. We haven’t had a good bad guy take down in a while and my ego is starting to take a bruising always coming second to you.”

Acting like Yang’s self-confidence could _ever_ be knocked by something as simple as Blake dressing better than her was a ridiculous thought never mind reality, but Blake couldn’t help but be a little flattered at the insinuation.

“You charmer-”

Yang’s eyelids fluttered at the praise.

“I do try.”

“-But I’m sure you’ll get to come first at some point.”

Before Blake could take back what she said, although the mirth in Yang’s eyes beat out the chance of _that_ ever being a possibility, a strangled yelp came from behind them.

“ _Really_? You’re talking about sex at breakfast? Can you two not just be normal for once and let the rest of us live in peace?”

Weiss strode around them throwing the dirtiest looks she could muster while carrying a bowl of muesli and yoghurt while still blinking the sleep out her eyes.

“We weren’t talking about sex, it’s not our problem you’re so dirty minded Weiss- got something on your mind?”

The spluttering that followed the question answered the question better than any words could have, even if Weiss had wanted the answer to be something else. She really was the butt of so many jokes that just her taking them in a good-natured way was still a massive learning process for her, although Yang and Blake endeavoured to give her as many opportunities to practice as possible.

They were such good teammates.

“The way you two throw out innuendos I’m honestly not surprised she thought that- you do realise you were talking about mouth dexterity literally a minute ago.”

Blake almost jumped out her seat but managed to school her reactions to only almost dislocating something in her neck whipping her head around to spot the source of the comment.

“ _Ruby_! When did you get here?”

Their leader was balanced precariously on the back two legs of her seat, reading one of the comics Jaune had lent her and munching a chocolate cereal bar. The position didn’t seem to worry her as she idly flipped the page and looked up at the pair of accusing eyes, blowing an odd strand of her hair away from her face.

“I've been here the whole time…” Ruby narrowed her eyes at the pair of them, “Did you really not notice? I’d be more offended if you hadn’t spent the whole time fixated on each other.”

She punctuated her point by slamming her front chair legs down as she finished speaking, keeping her eyes narrowed at them, clearly trying to force some feelings of guilt to the surface. That wasn’t going work while Blake was too busy poorly attempting to get the loop of “ _fixated on each other_ ” to stop playing in her head and she certainly wasn’t going to look at Yang to see her reaction.

Which left Weiss as the breaker of awkward silences, a talent she had not managed to get close to learning yet.

“Soooo, what were you two talking if it wasn’t sex? Or was it? Ruby didn’t really clear anything up for me.”

Finally, Yang spoke, the odd dazed expression on her face clearing up as she realised that she did, in fact, have an answer for their teammates.

“No, it was _not_ sex, you just came in at the most inopportune moment Weiss.” She paused and looked thoughtful, “Or maybe the most _opportune_ moment, your reactions are just so good y’know.”

Weiss looked unimpressed but stayed silent.

“We are actually gonna go on a da- out to dinner tonight, me and Blake, to just chill and get away from Beacon.”

The stutter was not missed by Blake, nor the rest of the team, but for the sake of Yang’s sanity, no one said anything. If anything, Ruby looked surprisingly smug about the whole thing, eyeing up her team like she had finally completed a puzzle. Suddenly jumping to her feet, she clapped to fully grab everyone’s attention.

“Right then, we have a whole Saturday ahead of us before the ‘ _Not a Date’_ Dinner, time’s a-wasting, time that could better be spent training. Let’s go Team RWBY!”

With a flourish she left three stunned girls behind her. Yang was the quickest to pick up on order and made to follow her sister with a fond eye roll to her teammates, one of whom was looking mournfully at her mostly full bowl of muesli.

“I think you’re going to have to bring it with you Weiss.”

The look Blake got in return for her comment was genuinely one of the saddest things she'd ever seen.

_The “Date”_

Ruby and Weiss had agreed to give them the room to change (partially so that Weiss wouldn’t be “accidentally” exposed to any more innuendo) which was to be followed by a goodbye near the dining hall. The other half of their team was happy to just be out the way of their “ _weird aura_ ” as Ruby had so kindly put it, Weiss had surprisingly agreed with the statement with a fond eye roll before leaving the room with a large pile of books that suggested Ruby was not going to have a great time today. As a duo they had taken the decision to dress separately, to keep the surprise of their outfits just a little bit longer.

The choice suited Blake, who somehow still managed to have _some_ outfits her teammates haven’t seen yet, most likely due to her mother’s insistence that they go shopping whenever she had headed home. Apparently rebel chic was not Kali Belladonna’s favourite style. If she was being honest, it was not her preferred style either, but she had managed to pull it off with flare and the whole monochrome and purple looked suited her well enough.

The black leather trousers she picked certainly also suited her well enough. Although while the fashion gods had blessed her with good taste, they had seen her pride and decided to knock her down a peg or two: the silky purple blouse she’d chosen had lost a button in the most awkward of places. Not one to back down from a challenge, Blake opted to get arts and crafty.

Ten minutes and a liberal application of boob tape later, she’d successfully managed to dress herself up _more_ than what she was originally going for. Ironically enough, the establishment she’d chosen for dinner would probably have less of a problem with her showing off the top of her navel and _artfully contoured_ _breasts_ than if she’d left on the bra.

Never let it be said Blake Belladonna doesn’t know how to dress, she’d say it herself: She looked _hot._

A light black jacket and heeled boots completed the look, a look that had just enough effort put into it to pass for a fake date and just enough effort to be remembered in the future…

For reasons.

Her bow left on her bedside table, she headed off to meet her “date” downstairs, unusually nervous at the prospect of dinner with her best friend.

Yang was dressed to impress. Not that she didn’t always dress well, but Blake didn’t get to see her properly dressed up that often and even if it was technically fake she was glad Yang decided to make the effort. A niggling voice at the back of her head asked why she was glad, why her heart skipped a beat knowing that Yang dressed up for _her_.

As if she had been privy to some of Blake’s more embarrassing thoughts, Yang had tied her hair up, so her long neck was left exposed. Instead of being able to run her anxious hands through her golden mane, she was left nervously brushing her fringe down; idly Blake thought it could probably use a cut as it fell over the lovely lavender of her eyes, but overall the effect was stunning. However, there was one thing that blew the hairdo out of the water-

“You’re wearing a suit.”

Yang unselfconsciously gestured at herself, “You like?” The smirk she also wore said she already knew the answer.

Blake did like. Where Yang had found a grey suit and managed to keep it hidden from them all this time she would never know, it was very clearly at least partially tailored to fit the boxer’s more unusual proportions. Her broader shoulders were not a problem as the jacket tapered artfully down to Yang’s slimmer waist, a single button fastening it together and accentuating her boobs incredibly. A charcoal grey tie was neatly knotted at the base of her throat, contrasting wonderfully with the pristine white shirt she’d chosen. It was, for lack of better words: A Look.

Then Blake realised a small problem.

“I do like, but really? We both wore suits?”

Yang couldn’t help but laugh at Blake’s exasperation and the shake of her head. Could they _be_ anymore stereotypical? Even if they weren’t technically dating… this was something else.

“This isn’t gonna work out Blake, we can't both be the pants wearer in this relationship.”

“Oh, I'm pretty sure we both know who wears the pants in this relationship.”

Blake’s tone brooked no argument, she didn’t just think that _she_ wore the pants, she _knew_ she did. In her opinion, Yang had no leg to stand on considering how much of a pushover she was. Blake had a sneaking suspicion that her partner knew it was a futile argument, but in the interests of defending herself, she did at least attempt a rebuttal.

“I’m gonna let that one slide for now, to be returned to in the sparring ring. Where I, the mighty Yang Xiao Long, shall show you, Blake Belladonna, how I am most definitely the owner of the pants in this relationship.”

Oh yeah, that was definitely only going to end one way.

“I’ll believe that when I see it, but really, a suit?”

If it was possible for a puppy to look affronted, then Yang was doing her best impression of said puppy and pinching the lapels of her jacket to emphasise her words.

“Suits are classy! You said classy and I thought you were gonna wear that hot dress you have!”

Her eyebrow arched of its own accord and Blake was unable to hide the skepticism in her voice.

“Which hot dress?”

Her partner didn’t miss a beat.

“The black one.” Yang answered with a satisfied nod. There was a pause.

“Which black one?”

Yang shrugged, finally caught out.

“Honestly any of them, you’re hot in all of them,” She checked the time, “And not that you are not looking _absolutely_ smoking in that but there’s time to change-”

After all the time she spent getting ready Yang had a better chance of getting Weiss in a tracksuit than getting Blake to change.

“We are going on Bumblebee, this is more practical.”

She actually stamped her foot at that, Yang Xiao Long was _that_ sort of person.

“Curse your practicality, I would have booked a taxi if I’d known this is how it was gonna go.”

Smiling wryly at the thought of a taxi making its way all the way up to Beacon just to turn around to head right back to Vale, Blake almost missed Yang grabbing her hand to go. Even if she hadn’t anticipated it from her movements, the spark that ran through her whole body as soon as it happened would have alerted her to their closeness.

Luckily Yang didn’t seem to notice the panic that ran through her partner at the touch, she was too busy waving goodbye to the random students around them, who likely had only the vaguest idea of who they were.

“Bye losers be very jealous of my hot girlfriend and be extremely jealous you aren't getting a ride on Bumblebee!”

Yang’s grin was met by Blake’s amused smile.

“That was unnecessary, you don't need to announce to the whole school that we're leaving to go on a fake date.”

The hand dragging her suddenly pulled harder, artfully spinning Blake around to face Yang with a combination of her natural reflexes and pure luck the only thing stopping her from faceplanting.

“Ah but if this was for reals, I, Yang Xiao Long, would definitely announce it to the whole school,” She paused for a moment, sizing up the room as they left, “There would probably be more flashing lights though, just to make sure everyone knew, can’t leave anyone out of the loop.”

Blake had a curious habit of bringing out Yang’s more theatrical side, a more light-hearted and boastful part of her partner that always prides itself on being just heartfelt enough to fall short of obnoxiousness. She let herself be pulled to the place where Yang had somehow managed to wrangle a parking spot out of Goodwitch, through means that she never bothered to explain to anyone else.

The ride, as all rides on Bumblebee tended to be, was fast, exhilarating and borderline attempted murder.

Blake loved it. Had anyone else been driving, even herself, she would have hated every single moment of it, but Yang loved it and she trusted Yang not get them killed.

Well, she trusted Yang not to break Bumblebee, them not breaking every bone in their body was simply a side effect. Still, no matter how much she trusted Yang she wasn’t going to leave her life to the chance of a particularly sharp corner, so casually gripped the girl’s hips and wished she could hug her tighter without crossing a line.

_The Restaurant_

Yang had enjoyed the ride from Beacon, how could she not? The fresh air on her face, Bumbleby purring below her and Blake's hands on her hips… _heaven_. Did she kind of want Blake to hug a bit closer? _Sure._ But the downside of having someone as fearless as her as partner meant that she was going to have compromise on some things. Yang let out a low whistle as they pulled up and turned to face the girl on the back of her bike.

“You sure this is the right place?”

“Yep,” Blake said, with a delightful pop of the P, “Absolutely certain.”

The valet (this place had a _valet?_ ) looked slightly confused as to what to do with her bike, especially with her reluctance to part with it, until Blake negotiated him into simply rolling her bike to a spot near the door. Yang sheepishly tipped him a healthy amount and turned to follow Blake in the door, getting a slight shock as she wrapped her arm around her own and leant in, shaking her head at the whole palaver. Blake pulled her towards the door.

“C’mon Yang, it’s too cold to be hanging around out here, I’m sure the nice gentleman will make sure no harm comes to Bumblebee.”

After one last twist of her neck to check for sure, Yang let herself be pulled into restaurant and the question of the safety of her bike was immediately pushed out her mind in favour of a million others. Like, was that _real gold_? How many chandeliers is too many? Did this place have too many? Was it okay for her to be wearing shoes on this carpet? If she lay down on it to have a nap how quickly would they kick her out? Blake didn't seem to notice the decor or Yang's wonder, strolling in like she belonged there.

“Okay, I _need_ to know, how did you know about this place? Not that I’m disputing your classy credentials, but this is a slightly more Weiss-like place than I expected.”

Blake raised her eyebrow questioningly, probably at the use of Weiss’ name as an adjective. _Wait til she hears what Blake-like means._

“Recently reconnecting with your father ‘ _The Chieftain of Menagerie_ ’ does have some extra perks, _especially_ when it comes to being wined and dined when my parents come to visit.”

As if that explained everything, and it sort of did, the girl strode off to check their reservation, leaving Yang to follow her and now take in the subtler extravagance of the restaurant. Having met Blake’s parents’ on a few occasions she could definitely see them picking somewhere like here; well decorated and a subdued atmosphere without feeling impersonal. There was also the matter of diversity. From just initial glances Yang had spotted a few Faunus servers and diners intermingled with humans.

Her eyes flickered to Blake’s uncovered ears and she felt a pit in her stomach for all the times she’d picked somewhere to go without a second thought to the possible trouble it might cause Blake.

They were led to a booth slightly hidden from the rest of the room by a heavy curtain, to offer a modicum of privacy on both sides. The intimacy would have scared Yang if she didn’t crave to be hidden away from the world with just Blake to keep her company.

The restaurant oozed fancy at every possible opportunity. The waiter left them to get settled, clearly picking up on some of the signals that this was meant to be a private occasion, letting them breathe for a moment and allowing Yang to pick up her train of thought.

“I keep forgetting you’re loaded.” At Blake’s smirk of superiority Yang couldn’t help but groan, “You let us believe you were orphaned for _so long_ \- even _Weiss_ felt bad. Ruby was so close to inviting you over at the holidays.”

Blake was trying hard not to laugh, to compose herself before she got them both kicked out of the fancy restaurant before they’d even had a chance to look at the menu.

“Wait, you thought I was an _orphan_?”

Yang threw her hands up, exasperated.

“What were we supposed to think? A murky past that you _never_ talked about, you _never_ mentioned any family,” Yang leaned in close for emphasis. “Blake when you said your parents were calling I almost died, you were too panicked to notice we were losing our God. Damn. _Minds_ in the background! We thought you were an orphan with a tragic backstory!”

The subject of her story had her hands clamped over her mouth as her shoulders shook with laughter but even that didn’t stop a snort escaping. Eventually Blake calmed down enough to hiccup out a question.

“Wh- what did you think my tragic backstory was?”

Yang threw her hands up, trying desperately not to raise her voice any more that necessary.

“I don’t know, you were in the White Fang as a teenager and came out basically a ninja- I thought your life had been more teenage revolution than teenage rebellion!”

Her giggling died down at the description of her life before Beacon and Yang worried she’d maybe crossed a line until she realised Blake had transitioned to silently crying with laughter. She wiped the tears from her eyes, blinking to avoid smudging her make-up and quietly gulped in air.

“I’m getting you to write my biography, hands down that's the funniest and least scarring way of describing my early teenage years.”

The pair shared a conspiring grin as a waiter appeared with water, menus and the sly suggestion of the best sharing dishes; wine was ordered with the promise of a bottle and quick food decisions upon his return. So far, so smooth.

“All I’m sayin’ is that in a team like ours I thought it was best that I don’t jump to conclusions about people’s parents, I wasn’t going to be the one to bring it up.”

Blake was smart enough not to prod that any deeper, she knew enough about Yang’s family to understand why the idea of a nuclear family might not be the first one to pop up in her mind. She smoothly changed the subject.

“What are you thinking of getting?”

Blake leant forward conspiratorially, as if she was trying to get a look at her menu and then Yang vaguely realised she’d stopped breathing properly at the “V” Blake’s ridiculously low buttoned, silky purple shirt made. Sure, she'd noticed it earlier (How could she _not_ ) but their banter about the suits had distracted her. Now Yang was left to fully take in how fucking good Blake looked, and it completely blew all her words out the window- why did Blake not show off her chest more?

Yang was brought out of her stupor by the questioning look on said hot girl’s face and she tried to cover it up by pointing at her own menu

“I’m sorry, I’m just fantasising about what an incredible steak I’m gonna demolish by the end of this meal.”

An odd look crossed Blake’s face, like she was about to say something to the contrary but quickly decided against it, instead leaning back against her chair as the waiter re-appeared with their wine and a pair of delicate glasses. A demonstration of his expert pouring skill followed, the sort of service you pay for in a place like this.

They quickly decided on their meals, Yang going with her aforementioned steak and Blake going for a slightly more refined veal dish. A dish that Yang could neither pronounce or even think to try to stomach, clearly her palette needed to be expanded if she was going to keep hanging out with the Daughter of the Chieftain of Menagerie, Blake Belladonna.

She searched around for possible topics of conversation, the silence wasn’t awkward by any means, it just seemed like such a waste of the opportunity to speak without the chance of someone else overhearing. Beacon’s walls had ears that were surprisingly nosey.

“So, how’s Sun doing.”

Yang internally cringed, _What a topic to land on, yep talk about her ex, girls love that_. Blake clearly wondered why she was bringing him up too, judging from the cute head tilt and ear twitch combo she was pulling off so, _so well_.

“I mean, good? But you talk to him too, I definitely know you two talk.”

Well, that wasn’t _untrue_ , but in this case, Yang was uncharacteristically scrabbling for topics of conversation with her partner, a situation she had _never_ been in before. Usually their conversations flowed easily, reaching natural crescendos and finding a never-ending number of tangents and thoughts to bounce between and even in the low points they still followed the gentle drift guided by their friendship. They made an unlikely but surprisingly talkative pair, even if at the beginning Yang had been the one doing most of the talking, until she had managed to pry Blake’s sense of humour from under the many layers of defensive walls.

“I was just curious to know what you talk about.”

“Odd thing to be curious about.”

So, she was having dinner with Detective Blake tonight.

Great.

“If you _must_ know,” Yang relented, “We only trade insults and ab workouts, they’re intense but _god_ his work.”

There was a momentary flash in Blake’s eyes, of appreciation or jealousy she couldn’t tell but either way there was a fleeting glance at Yang’s currently hidden muscles. She preened internally, if she had been inspired ( _competitively driven_ ) to work on her own abs after meeting Sun, well, that was her own business.

“Sun’s good.” Blake must have realised that this topic was inevitably going arise at some point and that fighting it was a losing game. Sometimes comparisons happen. “He talks about his team, what they’re doing at school, when he plans to go back to Vacuo.” She smiled slightly, “We had a long discussion about whose team would win in a fight.”

Blake’s smile turned smug. “It was us. We are, without a shadow of a doubt, most definitely the stronger team.”

“A _long_ discussion?” Yang couldn’t help but be a little bit sceptical (And slightly disappointed in Blake’s lack of faith in Team RWBY), “It should have barely been a quick chat.”

“I didn’t want to bruise the poor boy’s ego _too_ much.”

Despite Weiss and Yang most often being the ones accused of the _inexcusable_ sin of Pride, Blake had an atrociously hidden prideful streak that often ended with her desire to prove herself beating out any sense of self (or team) preservation. Yang should have known that she would never let the side down in a game of tactical what ifs.

Even against her ex’s team.

“So thoughtful of you to go easy on him, _truly_ you are a saint.”

It was remarkably easy to get drawn into their playful banter, she had never met anyone who made it quite so easy to bounce off, who just _got_ what she was trying to joke about but here Blake was, the perfect sparring partner, sitting right across from her.

“Your tone makes me think otherwise.”

“Knowing you for a year and a half makes me think otherwise.”

Blake had the audacity to laugh at that.

“It’s taken you a year and a half to realise that? I’m disappointed Yang.”

Eager to defend herself and return fire, Yang replied.

“Oh no… I had an inkling at the start and was definitely sure after _hmm_ \- four months?”

Her tone was teasing, fully immersed in their conversation and ready to keep the rally going as long as she could make last.

“So… if I’m not a saint, what am I?”

Okay, so she might not have been _quite_ ready for that question, in that voice, coming from Blake, dressed like that.

“If I say sinner… how dirty minded does that make me sound?”

No one could make an eyeroll look as sarcastic as Blake could. Well maybe Weiss, but hers were always more judgy.

“It _sounds_ like you’re not really trying… and that you’re _very_ dirty minded.” The way Blake rolled her _r’s_ did _things_ to Yang, _things_ that proved their conversation true.

“You’re not saying I’m wrong though.”

This was getting dangerous- clearly her sparring partner thought so too, judging from the heavy silence that had fallen on their little corner of the world. It could have been the whole world for all Yang cared. It _was_ the whole world right now in her mind.

“No, I’m not…” Blake picked her words carefully, like she was aware of the many paths her reply could lead them down. “I’m also not saying you’re the only dirty minded one here.”

Was it an impasse if both sides were happy with the result? Did it become a stalemate if either side could move and win but chose not to? Could a moment like this be described as awkward if neither party was able to acknowledge it, being so involved in their own thoughts? Yang sipped at her wine as she watched Blake fiddle with the sleeve of her top, not anxiously, but more seemingly more apprehensive at the thought of looking up and seeing Yang’s reaction to her statement.

The … _challenging_ … silence was interrupted by the arrival of their meals, the waiter dropping their meals down with a flourish and topping their wine up with the efficiency you paid for at a place like this. He hesitated a moment before leaving, as if he wanted to say something but his professionalism won over and he simply nodded, said, _Enjoy your food ladies,_ and left. Yang wasn’t too bothered, her whole world had tunnel visioned down to her gorgeous smelling plate of food and how quickly it could get into her mouth. She hadn’t realised how hungry she was, her appetite had been pushed to the side by nerves that she couldn’t shake. Nerves that had never appeared before at the prospect of spending time with Blake.

Still, now she could dig in, following Blake’s lead with a small hum of approval at the first taste of her meal; it had been a while since Yang had been treated to such good food. They swapped food, Blake wordlessly holding out a fork full of her veal with some of her vegetables, insistently waving it at Yang until she had to try it, staving off her apprehensiveness at trying veal just for her. The smug smile Blake wore at Yang’s hum of approval at the food was priceless, but Yang simply rolled her eyes.

“I’ve never tried veal before, I didn’t wanna cough it up in a fancy restaurant if I didn’t like it.”

Blake continued smirking, gesturing at Yang’s plate, “Are you not going to let me have a taste?”

Again, Yang was struck with the incredible disbelief that Blake _didn’t know how that sounded_. There was no way someone could be that dumb… right? Still, she picked up the next bit of steak she’d cut off and offered it to Blake, who took it and smiled as she chewed it. It got the nod of approval, though not as much as her own veal dish because clearly, she wasn’t going to let it go that she ordered something fancy that Yang couldn’t pronounce. If she’d wanted that on a date she would have picked Weiss.

“How long do you think we can keep this whole thing up before we get rumbled?”

The slight non-sequitur startled Blake, but she quickly caught onto the what Yang was thinking.

“This?” She gestured to the tiny table that separated them. “I don’t know… I could get used to this, it could be fun to see how long we get away with it.”

It would also be fun to see how long Yang could survive under water and both options had equal chance of killing her, except one slowly and painfully the other quickly and painlessly. Blake went on, oblivious to Yang’s inner turmoil.

“Who knows how long it will take for CRDL to get the message?”

“Well some people seem to think we’re a natural fit, so it can’t really be that long,” She realised what she had said and looked down at the table, “I don’t know how it worked out like that but hey, might as well use it to our advantage.”

The conversation with JNPR stuck in her mind, along with the muted reactions of much of the school population at their announcement. What were they seeing? Were they seeing a one-sided thing, or could Yang have hope?

“I mean,” Blake finished swallowing a mouthful of her food, “I’m stuck with you until graduation either way but that’s a bit of a long way to go for a joke…”

Yang could see the uncertainty in her eyes - hear her voice her objections, “ _Yeah it would suck to date you until then_ ” - and it cut deep. She could go hours and hours forgetting this all wasn’t real and then a comment could bring the whole situation into the harsh light of day.

“Uh, yeah - maybe a bit too far. I’m definitely not that good of an actor.”

That was the way to do it, steer the conversation towards how fake this whole thing obviously was, the double bluff, the misdirection. Not usually her area of expertise, but hey this was _not_ a normal situation. They were left sitting in a silence that dabbled in an awkwardness only held at bay by their friendship, continuing their respective meals without offering up a bite to try like before but still relatively comfortable. Then Blake spoke again, clearing her throat.

“I don’t think you’re a bad actor,” Yang raised a questioning brow at that, “I mean, you’ve fallen quite naturally into the girlfriend role.”

Yang’s heart stopped- this was a crossroads: she could blow it off, act like it was no big deal, like she could be with anyone the same way. Like Blake wasn’t special. But Blake was _special_ and if there was a moment to tell her it was now- in a fancy restaurant, at the tail end of a good meal filled with good conversation.

“Blake, I-”

“Why have you never dated seriously here?”

Trust Blake to somehow dodge a possible hard conversation before it had even come up… it took some talent to beat out the whole Faunus reveal fiasco in first year.

“Like you could have had anyone and they’d be grateful,” There was no stopping Blake now she was on a roll. “I mean, they don’t know you as well as I do so the reveal that you’re actually a complete dork that is a massive pushover might come as a surprise.” A fond smile graced her mouth and spread right up to her eyes. “But seriously, the reputation ruining secret dorkiness aside- why haven’t you found someone?”

The answer lay at the tip of her tongue but the courage to let it slip out left Yang the moment Blake had interrupted her, like is was some cosmic sign that the timing just wasn’t right yet.

“Anyone and they’d be grateful? Do I detect jealousy?”

“What’s there to be jealous of?” She mockingly gestured at the table in front of them, “I don’t see anyone else sitting here on “ _date_ ” with you.”

“Don’t get too big for your boots, I cancelled at least three dates to be here.”

“ _Three_? Now who’s too big for her boots?”

She couldn’t hold in her laugh anymore, Blake’s jokingly caustic tone was two much not to break down at, both of them fully in the knowledge that while she technically _could_ have three dates, Yang’s recent dating record was a blank slate.

“Well right back at you Blake – as you so kindly mentioned – I’m not sitting here on my own. As far as I know, you’re just as, if not _more_ , single than me.”

This time it was Blake chuckling at the slight insult, scrunching her eyes up as she mockingly glared across the table.

“Insulting your date isn’t a good show you know, I guess we’re both just bad at it,” Blake stuck her tongue out quickly, “I’m just awful at the cheesy romance stuff, it doesn’t come naturally.”

Yang raised a skeptical eyebrow.

“I wouldn’t say that, you’re chill with me- us, the team. How could you be bad at touchy feely stuff even after reading all those books? Surely they must have _some_ tips in them.”

Her glare was slightly less mocking than before, sharper at the dig at her reading materials.

“What I _mean_ , is that I’m self-conscious and kind of performative in relationships that don’t really have a good base… I need a friendship there first. You’re my best friend and really easy to be around,” She rolled her eyes fondly, “You managed to turn me into a hugger in a year and half, that’s no easy feat.”

If Blake had been a Faunus with more sensitive hearing, Yang swore that she’d be able to hear her heart beating out of her chest as it tapped danced to the beats of Blake’s almost confession. She managed to play it cool, somehow her words came out unwavering.

“I guess you’re just as good an actor as me then.”

She looked torn at that, as if Blake was weighing up a rebuttal to Yang’s statement, despite its truth; Blake had been nothing but the exemplar girlfriend this whole time, her performance was flawless. But it was just that, a performance.

Their plates were cleared away by the same waiter, swiftly coming in and sweeping all their plates away – Yang admired the efficiency as his speed almost put Ruby to shame – he left two dessert menus in place, one of which Yang quickly snatched up to peruse. If their dinners had been that luxurious, she could only imagine what delicacies they could whip up with enough sugar and dairy products. Balking slightly at the prices, she looked up to see Blake regarding her with an enigmatic smile.

“Should we talk about the elephant in the room?”

Yang froze, those words were never good when you were harbouring a secret crush on the girl you were fake dating, “I don’t know what you could _possibly_ mean.”

Blake fixed her with a look of playful exasperation.

“I’m talking about how I’ve had your tongue in my mouth more than I ever expected before-“

A relieved laugh exploded from Yang, shaking slightly from the rush of adrenaline that had come with the anticipation of what Blake could have said, who was now also giggling at her reaction.

“There’s that and there’s the fact that I don’t think I expected you to be such a good kisser,” She inhaled slightly, readying herself to say something, “You know, I’ve never been kissed like you kissed me, how much of that was practice?”

The mood turned from playful to electric in the span of her question, their eyes locking as Blake looked up from delicately running her fingers around the rim of her wine glass. Her question had been nonchalant, but Yang could see the curiosity in her gaze as her eyelashes flickered, a telling sign that her focus was split between Yang’s lips and her eyes.

There were times Yang could tone down her cockiness and then there were times like this.

“Oh, spent a lot of time thinking about how good I was at kissing, did you?” Blake’s cheeks coloured but she didn’t break eye contact, “I don’t give away my secrets _that_ easily Blake, girl’s gotta have some mystery. You could call it intuition I suppose, a little bit of natural talent.” Fortuitously, the next sip of wine she then took left a mark on her lips, allowing her to _display_ some of that natural talent. It did not go unnoticed, judging from the way Blake’s full attention went straight to her lips and her faunus ears stilled from their usual natural movement.

The corners of Yang’s lips turned up, _Oh yeah, she liked that._

Blake’s answering smile was wicked as she took a sip of her own drink and restarted their staring contest, giving Yang the odd feeling that she was being sized up by a predator. She hummed in contentment- Yang personally didn’t think the drinks were _that_ good-

“Hmm, that _mysterious_ mouth dexterity.”

Yang thanked all her lucky stars that she hadn’t been drinking anything else at that precise moment or else Blake may have ended up with a face full of wine.

“I thought we weren’t bringing that up?”

It came out as more of a whine than she would have liked it to be, especially since Blake had not stopped smirking while Yang had choked on air. She gestured to the sky, golden eyes twinkling with the laughter she was hiding behind her smirk.

“But how could I miss such cosmic perfect timing?”

She couldn’t help but act a bit petulant at her completely acceptable answer, who was Yang to deny someone the opportunity to be just a little bit dick by teasing someone else – she certainly did it enough.

“You're a little minx you know that? You and your incredible dress sense and your kinky books.”

Blake had preened at the compliment to her dress sense but had to stop herself from accidentally inhaling her wine in shock at the second part. The adorable scowl that followed it left Yang’s heart sore with longing, to just lean over and kiss it away. Any tension that had been simmering after the discussion of their kissing techniques had been doused by Yang’s comment. Maybe it was a good thing, she didn’t know how much long she could take flirty Blake, sitting there all done up like a million Lien with all the cards in her hand, waiting to play them and ruin Yang’s fragile grip on her composure.

The lull in the conversation was smoothly taken advantage of by a waitress arriving with what looked to be the most decadent cheesecake Yang had ever seen, setting it down carefully between the two bewildered girls. Blake interrupted the laying of the spoons by saying what was on Yang’s mind.

“I’m sorry but we didn’t order dessert, I think you might have the wrong table.”

Instead of picking it back up and leaving, she just smiled conspiratorially and spoke in a low voice.

“If you keep it between us, the staff think you’re a really cute couple and we’re allowed to do this every so often, so dig in!” She must have seen the looks on their faces and then, completely misinterpreting them, straightened up in alarm. “Of course, if you don’t like cheesecake, we can get you something else!”

“Uh-”

Yang quickly jumped in over Blake, grabbing her hand and sending her most dazzling smile in the direction of the waitress.

“The cheesecake is great! Absolutely brilliant addition to our date, thank you so much for your kindness.”

Blake caught on quickly, shifting to her own soft smile and squeezing Yang’s hand back.

“It’s so thoughtful of you all, we were just a bit shocked because it’s our first proper date, so I guess we forgot about everyone else, you know how it is.”

The waitress beamed.

“We never would have guessed; you guys work so well together! I’ll let you enjoy your dessert in peace.”

As she spun on her heel and strode off, Yang caught her a throwing thumbs up to a small crowd of other waiters and waitresses gathered by one of the doors. Face heating up, she turned back to a similarly blushing Blake and realised their hands were still entwined on the table. Playing with her fingers before slowly disentangling them to grab a spoon, she tried to subtly wipe her now sweaty hand on a napkin.

Blake caught her, and her soft smile of embarrassment morphed into a slight smirk; Yang couldn’t get anything passed her.

“Not that good of an actor, huh?”

Yang stuck out her tongue. It was that or melt into a small puddle and ruin the restaurant’s lovely carpet.

“Did you not see how expensive this cheesecake is? I’m not letting you pass up free food, this relationship will never work if you think I’m the sort of person who doesn’t go back for free samples dressed differently.”

A soft chuckle fell from Blake’s mouth, shaking her head in quiet acceptance of her antics and picking up her own spoon to dig into their shared treat. The cheesecake was a decadent as it looked, the pair of them unable to hold back the quiet moans of approval before returning faster for a second bite and then a third. They quickly demolished the cake, the two of them making light work of it and soon sitting back satisfied with themselves. Blake lightly snorted as she looked at her, quickly throwing a napkin at her.

“You managed to get that everywhere, wipe your mouth down. ‘ _Epitome of class’,_ I think not.”

Doing what she was told, Yang grinned back at her and made a show of licking her lips.

“I’m a messy eater, what can I say?”

There was an innuendo in there somewhere, especially combined with her actions and Yang was trusting Blake and her “dirty mind” to find it, which she predictably did, judging from the colouring of her cheeks. To get the attention away from herself she waved down the waiter to ask for the bill, who quickly obliged.

The service was really something here.

They settled up the bill, splitting it and dropping plenty lien as a tip to their fantastic waiter and made their way towards the front door, where their jackets had been neatly stowed by the staff.

She was stopped before grabbing her jackets by Blake, who pulled her down to her face level and fixed her with a determined look. Before Yang could even begin to get her hopes up at the movement, Blake rubbed angrily at her cheek.

“ _Ouch!_ ”

Blake let go quickly, looking satisfied with her work, “Sorry, you missed a spot earlier.” She turned and grabbed their jackets, throwing a smile Yang’s way as she rubbed her cheek more gently, “Can’t take you anywhere can I?”

“You couldn’t have just said?”

At Yang's petulant tone Blake looked slightly penitent for the smallest of moment before clearly deciding against even thinking about apologising, instead she just continued like she hadn’t assaulted Yang’s cheek, “What do you want to do? We have time.”

Yang couldn’t ever stay mad at Blake, she just made it so hard.

“Wanna go for a walk? Should give it a bit before I drive us back, don’t want any accidents happening.”

Memories of their fights with Mechas, Grimm and even each other, flashed through Yang’s mind, weakening her excuse to extend the date with every remembered bruise. Thankfully, Blake either didn’t think too deeply about it (unlikely) or also didn’t want the “date” to end (in Yang’s dreams).

“It _is_ a nice night, I don’t think we should endanger any of Vale’s citizens more than we already do,” She pulled on Yang's arm, who would happily be dragged to the ends of Remnant by Blake, “Come on, I know the perfect place.”

They walked out passed the valet guy, Yang checking slyly for herself that her beloved bike was okay. Obviously not sneakily enough.

“Bumblebee is _fine_ , Yang, stop stressing.”

Yang coughed and turned, embarrassed to have been caught staring but Blake wasn't even looking at her. Until she turned around under a street lamp, smirking with her arms folded.

“ _Caught you_ ,” Her tone was melodic and teasing, “Face it Yang, I know you way too well, I'd say it's a problem, but I guess we're in it for the long haul.”

Her breath caught, her cheeks probably coloured, and she definitely was staring too much for it to be not weird, but Yang couldn't help herself. Smug Blake was hot. Smug Blake - who casually said stuff that emphasised how close they were and how she wasn't gonna just drop out Yang's life - was like the sun: hot _and_ necessary for her continued existence on the planet. Trying to compose herself and not to overthink how tragic she was, Yang grinned sheepishly and rubbed the back of her neck.

“I guess that was payback for all the times I made fun of your taste in raunchy books?”

“Oh no,” Blake stalked towards her and whispered, “That was only for all the times you made fun of my taste in raunchy books _tonight_.” She smiled brightly as she continued. “I’ve got way more catching up to do.”

There was a certain gleefulness in her tone that Yang could only help but be wary of, Blake had a habit of being very, very good at getting her own back on people.

“I'm not sure I'm looking forward to what you have in store.”

They were very close now, Yang had to look down her nose to catch the cheeky grin forming on Blake’s smart mouth, and the closeness was not helping her blood pressure at all. Had the wine gone to both of their heads or were they both just caught up in the moment? The hammering of her pulse in her ears almost made her miss the next whispered comment.

“I think you might just enjoy it.”

Blake spun around to lead them on and Yang finally had a chance to fully ogle the shape of her partner’s gorgeous legs. Yang had thought she'd pulled out all the stops with her own outfit and yet somehow Blake had beaten her handily; she seemed to be intent on killing her through tantalising fashion choices that were going to be tormenting her for weeks after this. Where on Remnant Blake had dug up that pair of impossibly tight, _possibly_ leather, trousers were going to get a stern letter about indecency and then an order for many more.

Yang was certainly going to enjoy _something_ at least.

They talked about everything and nothing, ambling around the lamp-lit park as the sounds of the city dimmed with the sunset. There was something so comforting about Blake’s presence, she calmed all her rowdy thoughts and let her breathe and talk like she couldn’t to anyone else. They gossiped like old ladies, about their friends, their teachers, celebrities and thought up the most outrageous theories and series of events. However, there was something sticking at the back of Yang’s mind, something that had been bothering her since they had stepped into the restaurant. She eventually found the courage to put her troubled thoughts into words by the time they’d reached an old bandstand, stopping them on the stairs.

“I know there’s a bunch of stuff you don’t like to talk about but there’s one question I need to know the answer to,” Blake looked disconcerted with change in tone and clearly didn’t want any serious conversations on their night of letting loose and laughter, but Yang felt that she owed it to her, “And if you don’t want to answer it’s totally fine, but I feel like this one is simple.”

She took both of Blake’s hands in hers and tried to emphasise her words with squeezes.

“The restaurant was amazing Blake, _seriously_ your parents have good taste, but it made me realise something I think I’ve been overlooking since I met you and then since we became friends. I know you’re a faunus and it’s just one of the wonderful parts of you that makes you _you_ but I think I’ve been a bad friend.” It was Blake who squeezed her hands this time, trying to interject but failing as Yang continued. “How many times have I taken you somewhere where you didn’t feel accepted as _you_?”

Her hand ghosted over one of her feline ears.

“You relaxed so much when the waiter was a faunus, nevermind all the other faunus in the room, and I can’t believe I’ve been so blind this whole time. How could you not tell me?”

The mood was cold now, Blake’s eyes had narrowed to golden slits and the lights of the bandstand only reflected the smallest amount of light from her face.

“You’ve not been blind Yang, I just put my bow on, I didn’t want to make a big deal out of it-”

That deflection wasn’t going to stand in Yang’s eyes.

“It’s a part of you Blake! When will you realise that you are one of the most important people in my life? If it’s a problem for you it’s a problem for me.”

They were eye to eye now, Yang’s height advantage cancelled out by the steps of the bandstand boosting Blake’s height.

“It's not a problem Yang, the world is different for me, I learned to live with it.” Blake brushed passed Yang down the stairs of the bandstand, “Maybe you should learn to live with it too.”

Her hand shot out to catch Blake’s arm before she could move too far away but the faunus still refused to face her, the ears on her head completely flat like they were trying to block out anything Yang might say to make her change her mind. Which meant that she had to focus all Blake’s anger somewhere else and the only target around was herself, so she called out after her partner.

“You know I never learn, Blake.”

It did what she wanted, the angry girl stopped in her tracks turning while still not even looking at her.

“That's a complete lie.” She ground out the words between gritted teeth.

 _Hook, line and sinker,_  Blake was so predictable, continuing Yang put on her most air headed voice.

“Uh uh, dumb blonde over here who only knows how to solve problems with her fists, makes the same mistakes over and over.”

“ _Yang_ …” The tone was low and bristled with warning and Yang decided not to push her any further, changing tracks, but keeping on theme.

“You know I'd punch a thousand racists for you.”

Blake melted, the anger in her face drained away as she brought up her hand to rub her forehead, clearly exasperated with herself that she hadn’t seen this coming. How she hadn’t seen it coming was a mystery to Yang.

“The was the sweetest and absolutely the most dumb thing anyone's ever said to me.”

Yang grinned wildly, that was exactly what she was aiming for. She bounded down the stairs and wrapped Blake up in a warm hug, pulling herself back to look at her fully as she spoke.

“I’ve said it before and I’ll say it a million times again, I care about _all_ of you, no matter what you feel about some parts of yourself. I’d like to think you’d do the same for me. We’re a team, you’re my partner, you’re my… best friend.”

No matter how much she craved it, this was not the time to reveal her feelings. Blake needed her here, without any hint of an ulterior motive, just as a friend that would stand by her through it all and Yang would do anything for Blake, even if she didn’t believe it.

Golden eyes filled with tears that threatened to spill over and Yang would have felt worried if she couldn’t see the smile lighting up the rest of her face. Blake punched her lightly on the shoulder, grumpily glaring at her through her reluctant smile.

“Never call yourself dumb again, or _I'll_ be the one doing the punching. And I'll be punching you. You're smarter than anyone gives you credit for, including you.”

She couldn’t help herself, another chance to be cocky? Without being derided by her team? She couldn’t pass it up.

“Oh no, I’m _incredibly_ smart and I definitely know that, but sometimes you just need a shock to break you out of your circular logic spirals,” Yang cocked her head, “You really need to get out of your head more, Planet Belladonna sounds very anxious.”

A face planted itself in Yang’s chest, immediately reminding her of the last time she’d brought up a similar topic just a few days earlier. The giggles coming from Blake signaled that, similarly to last time, Blake wasn’t completely upset by their conversation, which Yang counted as a win.

“How do you always know exactly what to say?”

She couldn’t help but snort at that, had Blake not realised their form of conflict resolution involved Yang chasing her down and literally telling her all the reasons she was acting dumb? It had definitely happened enough times before for it to be a trend. A thing, if you will.

“You’re stubborn, I’m stubborn, I think we’ll always end up saying the right thing in the end.”

The face planted in her chest looked up, hopeful and bright in the moonlight that had now appeared above them.

“Even if it takes a few tries?”

“Especially if it takes a few tries. And probably a fight or two somewhere along the way.”

They stayed like that for a few moments, Yang imagining the fights she was going to have to get into to knock some sense into Blake, maybe literally. 

“Yang… I honestly don’t think I deserve you, I’ve done so much shit in my life and yet here you are, like some cosmic ray of good.”

The compliment warmed her, but if Blake wasn't going to take Yang putting herself down then she couldn't well let Blake put herself down either.

“You speak far too highly of little old me, I think we’re more like partners in crime.” She paused for a moment, backtracking, “Not _literal_ crime I’d hope, I mean our track record suggests it’s a possibility- “

The lighting in the park now lit Blake wickedly as she spoke.

“Come on Yang, _let me lead you to the dark side.”_

Blake should absolutely not be allowed to ever say those words in that voice. Thanking all her lucky stars that she was in the darkness Yang swung Blake around so she had her arm over her shoulders.

“Let's not do that, c'mon I think it’s time to go home.”

There was no argument as they ambled back to the restaurant to pick up the keys and Bumblebee, the walk was relaxed as they just enjoyed each other’s company.

 “Can you drive faster on the way back? You were definitely holding back earlier.”

The words were music to Yang’s ears, if Blake thought Yang knew just what to say to make her feel better then Blake knew just what to say to make her whole evening. Cracking out the cocky grin, Yang spun on her heel to face her trailing partner, who was smiling right back at her.

“Is that a challenge?”

An eyebrow cocked.

“Perhaps, you up for it… _Xiao Long_?”

Even if she had been the furthest possible from _Up for it_ , there was no denying she would push Bumblebee to its limits just to show Blake how fast she could go and wipe the taunting smirk off her face.

“You’re gonna be the death of me, _Belladonna_.”

Blake’s musical laugh rung in her ears the whole way home, even over the cacophonous roar of Bumblebee’s engine being pushed to its limits she could hear it and her laugh was only amplified by how tight Blake’s arms were wrapped around her waist. Amplified by the way she gasped breathlessly as they crested a hill or took a corner sharply. Amplified the way she buried her face into her back.

 

Yang was wrong: Blake wasn’t going to be the death of her, how could she be? How could she ever be anything but invincible around Blake?

__

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you didn’t know before, Yang is ride or die. Also Yang's kink is people not leaving her and Blake's kink is people loving her for her, I love Queens with issues!  
> God I wish I was this smooth on dates in real life, rather than wanting to throw up when cute girls look at me. That’s a real fact about me and I hate it so much.  
> The hardest thing about writing dinner dates is actually working out when their food gets ordered and then when they eat it- too much interrupting of their flirty banter for my liking.  
> Small appearance in this chapter by Weiss “Really? Right in front of my muesli?!” Schnee and Ruby “Hello, I am also here” Rose, I love them and they almost love their dumb teammates.  
> The next chapter is a small departure from the usual pace, a little Chapter 8: Extra Slice, which I came up with during one of my boring lectures in uni. One day it might be moved somewhere else but for now it will be in the place where most people will see it #exposure.  
> If anyone would like to draw them in their suits please, please, please send me the link, either here or on my Tumblr: gimmeboatsanddragons  
> Drop your favourite “Oblivious WLW” Moment in the comments. Or “Best “Fake” Flirting Line”. Again, I thrive on comments and this time I dropped a 10k chapter so please, go for it. Go wild, no comment is too short or too long.


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